SENATOR HOYLMAN DENOUNCES TRUMP FOR PROPOSED “DOMESTIC GAG RULE” ON ABORTION SERVICE PROVIDERS, CALLS ON STATE SENATE TO PASS REPRODUCTIVE HEALTH ACT

Senator Hoylman: “Trump’s outrageous restriction on Title X funding for doctors who provide or refer abortion services is state-sponsored discrimination and a disturbing threat to reproductive healthcare as we know it.”

“It’s more urgent than ever to stand firmly with abortion providers and pass Senate Democratic Leader Stewart-Cousins’ and Senator Krueger’s Reproductive Health Act.”

NEW YORK, NY - State Senator Brad Hoylman (D, WF - Manhattan) released the following statement  in response to news today that President Donald Trump intends to introduce a “domestic gag rule” that would slash funds from any health provider that performs or provides any information on abortion, denouncing Trump’s proposal and calling on the New York State Senate to pass Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins’ and Senator Liz Krueger's Reproductive Health Act (S3668/A1378).

State Senator Brad Hoylman said:  “Trump’s outrageous restriction on Title X funding for doctors who provide or refer abortion services is state-sponsored discrimination and a disturbing threat to reproductive healthcare as we know it. This kind of undisguised, Handmaid’s Tale-style sexism is not only morally repugnant, but simply bad policy, robbing low-income women of vital healthcare services. In New York, it’s more urgent than ever to stand firmly with abortion providers and pass Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins’ and Senator Liz Krueger's Reproductive Health Act, which brings the constitutional protections afforded by Roe v. Wade into state law. ”

The new restrictions to Title X will “gag” doctors and providers by banning access to Title X funding if they provide or mention abortion or abortion-related services, blocking patients from receiving the care and information they need. A gag rule would especially harm low-income, uninsured women who rely on Title X to afford vital healthcare services.

This proposal follows the Trump Administration’s reversal of requirements for employers to offer insurance that covers contraception for women and its creation of a new office within the Department of Health and Human Services devoted to so-called “conscience and religious freedom” in healthcare, which could permit limitations to available reproductive health services.

The Reproductive Health Act, sponsored by Senate Democratic Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Senator Liz Krueger, bars archaic and unconstitutional criminal statutes banning abortion, and moves New York’s abortion statute into the public health law. It also provides access to abortion care after 20 weeks if a woman’s life or health is it risk, or the fetus is not viable. The bill is currently stalled in the State Senate, where Senate leadership has refused to bring it to the floor for a vote.

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