Sponsored by:
Assemblywoman SHANIQUE SPEIGHT
District 29 (Essex and Hudson)
Assemblywoman ELLEN J. PARK
District 37 (Bergen)
Assemblywoman GARNET R. HALL
District 28 (Essex and Union)
Co-Sponsored by:
Assemblyman Venezia and Assemblywoman Drulis
SYNOPSIS
Secures protections for patients and providers accessing and providing legally protected health care activities; establishes right of residents to legally protected health care services, which are restricted in other states.
CURRENT VERSION OF TEXT
As introduced.
An Act concerning reproductive rights, and amending, supplementing, and repealing various parts of the statutory law.
Be It Enacted by the Senate and General Assembly of the State of New Jersey:
1. (New section) The Legislature finds and declares that:
a. All citizens of this State, and those who travel to this State for health care services, deserve the ability to safely access health care facilities in this State and the critical reproductive health and gender-affirming care services that they provide.
b. Since the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, 21 states and counting have banned or severely restricted access to abortion. In response to that decision, picketing at reproductive health care facilities increased by 21 percent and obstructions to these facilities increased by 538 percent nationwide. In New Jersey, there has been an approximately 30 percent increase in out-of-state patients, many of whom came to New Jersey because reproductive health care services are illegal in their home state.
c. In 2023, there were 23 reported violent incidents and threats made to health care facilities providing gender-affirming health care. Fourteen states, including New Jersey, offer protections to people who provide, seek, or assist those seeking gender-affirming health care. People seeking and providing this care deserve to be safe and protected.
d. In 2024, the Alabama Supreme Court in LePage v. Mobile Infirmary Clinic, P.C. (Docket No. SC-2022-0515, SC-2022-0579) ruled that embryos are extrauterine children, finding that that the states Wrongful Death of A Minor Act applies on its face to all unborn children, without limitation. The holding, and the legal analysis on which the decision was based, could impact any person in a state which recognizes the individual rights of fetuses created through in vitro fertilization (IVF) and any person who is seeking or providing IVF.
e. New Jersey has long been a state that supports, and provides protections for the reproductive freedoms and health care choices of its citizens, including the right to make the choice of whether to start or expand a family through in vitro fertilization (IVF).
f. New Jersey, through this act, will codify critical protections to those seeking and providing reproductive and gender-affirming health care. Further, this act is intended to ensure that anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQ+ persons cannot harm patients or providers.
2. (New section) As used in P.L. , c. (C. ) (pending before the Legislature as this bill):
Driveway means an entry from a public street to a public or private parking area used by a reproductive or gender-affirming health care services facility;
Entrance means a door to a reproductive or gender-affirming health care services facility that directly abuts the public sidewalk; provided, however, that if the door does not directly abut the public sidewalk, the entrance shall be the point at which the public sidewalk intersects with a pathway leading to the door;
Gathering means two or more individuals; and
Gender-affirming health care services means all supplies, care, and services of a medical, behavioral health, mental health, surgical, psychiatric, therapeutic, diagnostic, preventative, rehabilitative, or supportive nature, including medication, relating to the treatment of gender dysphoria and gender incongruence. Gender-affirming health care services does not include sexual orientation change efforts as defined by section 2 of P.L.2013, c.150 (C.45:1-55).
Impede means to obstruct, block, detain or render passage impossible, unsafe or unreasonably difficult.
Intimidate means to place a person in reasonable apprehension of bodily harm to themselves or to another.
Legally protected health care activity means providing, seeking, receiving, assisting with, or inquiring about reproductive health care services or gender-affirming health care services that are lawful in this State, regardless of the patients location.
Physical obstruction means rendering ingress to or egress from a reproductive or gender-affirming health care services facility impassable to another person, or rendering passage to or from a reproductive health care services facility unreasonably difficult or hazardous to another person;
Reproductive health care services includes all medical, surgical, counseling, or referral services relating to the human reproductive system, including, but not limited to, services relating to pregnancy, contraception, managing infertility, or the termination of a pregnancy;
Reproductive or gender-affirming health care services facility includes a hospital, clinic, office, or other site that provides, refers, or seeks to provide reproductive or gender-affirming health care services and includes the building or structure in which the facility is located and the driveway of such building or structure; and
Social media means an electronic service or account, or electronic content, including, but not limited to, videos or still photographs, blogs, video blogs, podcasts, instant and text messages, email, online services or accounts, or internet website profiles or locations.
3. Section 9 of P.L.1978, c.73 (C.45:1-22) is amended to read as follows:
9. In addition or as an alternative, as the case may be, to revoking, suspending or refusing to renew any license, registration or certificate issued by it, a board may, after affording an opportunity to be heard:
a. Issue a letter of warning, reprimand, or censure with regard to any act, conduct or practice which in the judgment of the board upon consideration of all relevant facts and circumstances does not warrant the initiation of formal action;
b. Assess civil penalties in accordance with this act;
c. Order that any person violating any provision of an act or regulation administered by such board to cease and desist from future violations thereof or to take such affirmative corrective action as may be necessary with regard to any act or practice found unlawful by the board;
d. Order any person found to have violated any provision of an act or regulation administered by such board to restore to any person aggrieved by an unlawful act or practice, any moneys or property, real or personal, acquired by means of such act or practice; provided, however, no board shall order restoration in a dollar amount greater than those moneys received by a licensee or his agent or any other person violating the act or regulation administered by the board;
e. Order any person, as a condition for continued, reinstated or renewed licensure, to secure medical or such other professi