The Quickie: Planned Parenthood Votes Reacts To The Iowa Caucus Results

Welcome to “The Quickie” — Planned Parenthood Action Fund’s daily tipsheet on the top health care & reproductive rights stories of the day. You can read “The Quickie'' online here.

In today’s Quickie: Planned Parenthood Votes reacts to Iowa caucus results and a state fights roundup. 

PLANNED PARENTHOOD VOTES REACTS TO THE IOWA CAUCUS RESULTS: Last night, Planned Parenthood Votes spokesperson Shwetika Baijal responded to Donald Trump’s victory in the Iowa caucus, reminding voters about the threat he poses and what’s at stake come November: “Donald Trump brags about overturning Roe v. Wade, but every day, we witness the chaos and cruelty caused by the Supreme Court decision that took away our federal right to abortion… If given the chance, Donald Trump will sign a national abortion ban because he cares about winning political fights and pleasing his supporters, not about standing up for our freedoms. As he inches closer to securing the Republican presidential nomination, Planned Parenthood Votes is committed to ensuring that voters understand the danger he poses to our reproductive freedom and fundamental rights.” 

Read the full statement here

STATE FIGHTS ROUND UP: Welcome back to PPFA’s state fights roundup — your weekly update highlighting key LGBTQ+ and abortion-related legislation moving during the 2024 state legislative session. We’re two weeks in to the year, and hundreds of bills have already been filed. While many of those bills carried over from last year, more than 160 anti-abortion bills have been filed in 25 states. The good news: we’ve seen over 200 proactive abortion bills filed in 26 states. Over forty-five bills attacking health care for the transgender community have been filed thus far, along with more than 55 proactive bills to expand access for transgender people. 

Here are some highlights from the first weeks of 2024: 

• Florida: Last week lawmakers introduced HB1233, a wide-ranging attack on trans people in the state. The bill would mandate any insurer providing coverage for gender-affirming care to cover “detransitioning;” define “sex” to mean only sex assigned at birth; undermine a person’s ability to align their IDs with their gender identity; and incorporate anti-trans language throughout state law. 

HB1519, a total abortion ban and dangerous fetal personhood bill that, among other provisions, would remove rape and incest exceptions and make providing an abortion a third-degree felony, has also been filed. 

• South Carolina: The House Committee on Medical, Military, Public and Municipal Affairs approved HB4624, a bill that would ban gender-affirming health care for anyone under 18. The measure would also prohibit Medicaid coverage of gender-affirming care for anyone under the age of 26. Lawmakers have also introduced several bills targeting abortion, including a total ban and a reason ban.
  
  Additionally, a new bill to increase parental involvement in minors' healthcare decisions (SB882) could impact access to a range of sexual and reproductive health care for young people. This bill would require health care providers to inform parents or guardians when prescribing medications to minors and pharmacies to have parental consent before dispensing the medication.
   
• New Hampshire: A proposed 15-day — yes, DAY — abortion ban (HB1248) and a bill prohibiting any abortion clinic from performing abortions after 15 weeks with “born alive” provisions (HB1541) were heard in the House Judiciary Committee last week. On the proactive front, lawmakers also heard CACR23, an amendment to add the right to abortion explicitly into the New Hampshire Constitution.
   
• Missouri: Several anti-trans bills will be heard in the House Emerging Issues Committee on Wednesday including a bill banning transgender people from using restrooms that correspond with their gender identity (HB1674), a bill allowing anti-trans providers to refuse to provide medical care for trans individuals (HB1519), and legislation to remove exemptions from the state’s gender-affirming care ban.

Several dangerous bills to entrench harmful notions of fetal “personhood”, strip abortion providers of all state funding, and ban state contracts with employers that help staff get abortion care out of state have also been introduced.

• Kansas: Last week, a total ban on abortion (HB2492) with limited exceptions was introduced. The bill includes a private right of action enforcement mechanism and has been referred to the House Committee on Health and Human Services.
   
• Ohio: Last week, the Ohio House voted to override Gov. DeWine’s veto of HB68, a bill banning gender-affirming care for trans and non-binary youth. The bill would also ban trans women and girls from participating in school sports that align with their gender identity. The veto override process now moves to the Ohio Senate, which convenes on Jan. 24th. Legislators also introduced HB371, a bill that poses a challenge to Issue 1, which enshrined the right to abortion in the state constitution.
  
  HB371 aims to eliminate the role of the judiciary in enforcing and interpreting Issue 1 and would grant exclusive authority over the measure’s implementation to the legislature. The bill has been referred out of the Rules and Reference Committee and is moving to the House Civil Justice Committee.
   
• Indiana: Anti-abortion lawmakers have introduced SB217, a bill to ban medication abortion, even in situations that would fall under the state’s current abortion ban exemptions, as well as legislation to establish fetal “personhood.” These include HB1379, which among other provisions, would expand the homicide chapter to apply to an 'unborn child'  and SB98, a bill that would allow a fetus to be considered as a “dependent child” for tax purposes.
   
• Idaho: The Idaho House State Affairs Committee introduced H0381, a bill that changes official statute language from “fetus” to “preborn child.” The change would move Idaho law further away from medical accuracy and could create legal ambiguity.
   
• Utah: In yet another attempt to undermine long-standing norms and processes, lawmakers introduced a joint resolution amending the rules of civil procedure. HJR8 would allow any side engaged in a lawsuit to file a motion to disqualify the assigned judge from a case, without cause.  
   
• Washington: Republican lawmakers introduced several harmful bills, including legislation to sanction abortion providers (SB 6075), attack transgender and non-binary students in schools (SB 6026), and ban gender-affirming care for minors in the state (HB 2241). 

For more information on what’s moving during this legislative session, reach out to [email protected].