A legislative committee cut up alongside occasion strains on Thursday over a proposed “protect regulation” to guard well being care professionals who provide gender-affirming care to transgender people.
Maine already has a regulation defending medical professionals who present abortions to girls from states the place abortions are banned or entry is restricted. The invoice that was endorsed by a majority of committee members on Thursday would strengthen and broaden these protections to suppliers who provide gender-affirming care to transgender people.
The vote within the Well being Protection, Insurance coverage and Monetary Providers Committee was 8-4, with all Democrats supporting the measure and all Republicans opposed. The measure now goes to the complete Home and Senate for consideration.
Underneath the invoice, LD 227, hospitals and docs wouldn’t should adjust to calls for for info on sufferers from states the place entry to care is restricted. Greater than a dozen different states have so-called protect legal guidelines for gender-affirming care whereas not less than 17 have such legal guidelines to guard abortion suppliers.
Lots of these legal guidelines have been enacted because the U.S. Supreme Courtroom overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, successfully handing regulation of abortion again to the states. The tradition battle over abortion has since expanded to gender-affirming care, which might embody hormone remedy, surgical procedure and different varieties of care.
“I want we weren’t on this scenario in america,” Democratic state Rep. Anne Perry of Calais, the invoice’s sponsor, stated previous to Thursday’s committee vote. “I’d be a lot happier if this was one thing that I felt we didn’t must do, fairly truthfully. However I introduced this ahead in good religion. And I undoubtedly will probably be supporting this invoice.”
However Republicans instructed that the invoice may violate the rights of fogeys of transgender kids or encourage kidnapping and trafficking of minors throughout state strains. Invoice supporters responded that the measure wouldn’t change any legal guidelines associated to folks’ rights in Maine or legal guidelines permitting the prosecution of criminal activity, similar to kidnapping.
Republicans additionally raised considerations about harming the connection between regulation enforcement businesses in Maine and different states. They usually accused Democrats of a scarcity of transparency as a result of the textual content of the invoice was launched solely days earlier than the general public listening to.
“I believe this complete course of is shameful,” stated Rep. Joshua Morris, R-Turner, who was one of many 4 votes in opposition to the invoice.
Final week, the proposal drew nationwide consideration after the attorneys normal from 16 states despatched a letter threatening authorized motion if Maine enacts the invoice. All the attorneys normal symbolize states which have restricted entry to abortion or gender-affirming care.
Of their letter to Maine Legal professional Normal Aaron Frey, Gov. Janet Mills and Democratic legislative leaders, the attorneys normal portrayed the invoice as an try and bully officers in different states. The group took specific concern with language that may enable well being care suppliers in Maine to counter-sue states that go after them for offering gender-affirming care.
“In America, we have now the proper to disagree,” the group wrote. “Maine has each proper to determine what Maine’s legal guidelines are and the way these legal guidelines ought to be enforced. However that very same proper applies to each state. One state can’t management one other. The totalitarian impulse to stifle dissent and oppress dissenters has no place in our shared America.”
Frey responded a day later by calling the considerations raised by his counterparts “meritless.” He additionally accused the opposite attorneys normal of trying to intimidate supporters of the invoice in Maine.
“We do have a proper to disagree and I totally concur that one state can’t management one other,” Frey wrote to Tennessee Legal professional Normal Jonathan Skrmetti. “Recognizing these shared values, I welcome your respect for Maine’s skill to determine what entry to well being care folks in Maine obtain, free from interference by out-of-state actors.”
This text seems by a media partnership with Maine Public.
