Duff: Senate Won’t Allow Vote On Anti-Choice, Anti-Women Bills

Jan. 23--Abortion has not been a front-burner issue at the state Capitol in several years, but the emotional issue reappeared Monday as both sides battled over women's health bills.

With Donald Trump becoming President and more conservative Republicans being elected to the state legislature, advocates on each side are galvanizing around the issues regarding women's health care.

Some Democrats are calling for taking the latest U.S. Supreme Court ruling that favors abortion rights and codifying it into Connecticut law. At the same time, some conservative Republicans are pushing for parental notification of abortions -- a controversial issue in Connecticut and around the country.

At a press conference with abortion rights advocates, Senate Majority leader Bob Duff of Norwalk said he hopes for votes on a package of bills that would preserve provisions for women in the federal Affordable Care Act in Connecticut, even as it is being dismantled nationally by the Trump administration.

"I feel even more confident in saying that we will not allow any anti-choice, anti-women bills to be voted on and passed in the state Senate," Duff said as the crowd applauded. "We are not going to have those come to a vote. I can't speak for the House ... but I can say very confidently in the Senate we will not take those bills up for a vote."

But conservative Peter Wolfgang of the Family Institute of Connecticut said that was a remarkable statement by Duff at the time of a power-sharing agreement with an even split between political parties in the Senate.

"I thought that was very presumptuous for him to declare what will and will not get a vote in the state Senate," Wolfgang said. "It seemed to me to be a challenge to the power-sharing agreement that they had all agreed on."

The Republican caucus, Wolfgang said, has become more conservative after the 2016 election, which sets the stage for a push for a potential debate on a parental notification bill on abortion. Connecticut is one of only seven states that has no parental notification when teens are seeking an abortion, he said. Nearby states such as Massachusetts and Rhode Island have such laws, and 43 states have some form of parental notification, he said.

Ten legislators, including Senators Len Suzio of Meriden, Joseph Markley of Southington and Michael McLachlan of Danbury, have sponsored three bills involving parental notification, said Christopher O'Brien, vice president of legislative affairs for Connecticut Right to Life.

"In Connecticut, you need your parents' permission if you want to get an aspirin at school or if you want to get a tatoo, but not if you need an abortion," Wolfgang said. "All we're trying to get here is a hearing on a parental notification law. Abortion is life-altering, major surgery in a young girl's life."

The news conference was held to highlight a package of five bills that are being pushed by Sen. Mae Flexer and other advocates. They are seeking to preserve provisions in the federal Obamacare law that call for avoiding cost-sharing for the patient for preventive health services for women, along with requiring that breast pumps are provided for nursing mothers. The pumps can cost about $200 and are currently covered under Obamacare.

Lawmakers are also calling for "preserving constitutional rights to healthcare against federal threats" that include placing the key provisions of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt into state law. The recent ruling in June 2016 came out strongly in favor of abortion rights and was among the biggest abortion rights cases in the past 25 years.

"In the last seven years, 338 state laws have been passed limiting women's rights to make their own reproductive and healthcare choices," Flexer said. "We're here today to make sure that that's not going to happen in the state of Connecticut. Unfortunately, this year there already have been several bills that have been introduced to limit those choices to healthcare for women."

After the press conference, Wolfgang and other supporters delivered their response to Flexer and others in the atrium of the Legislative Office Building in Hartford. Wolfgang was interrupted by Sarah Croucher, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Connecticut, who said she wanted to respond to some of the "incorrect points" that Wolfgang was making to reporters.

"The reason why we are one of the handful of states that have protected ourselves against parental notification laws is that those laws are damaging to the most vulnerable young women and young teens in our state," Croucher said. "We already have a mandatory counseling law. We don't force young people, who have been abused, to come up before a judge -- as they do in other states -- and we do not want to see that changed. We know we have bipartisan support to protect those laws."

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