New York Governor Signs Bill to Shield Abortion Providers from Liability
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
On Monday, New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed a legislation package aimed at shielding in and out-of-state abortion patients and providers from legal liability, anticipating the Supreme Court’s projected reversal of Roe v. Wade.
The package outlaws misconduct charges against doctors who provide abortions to patients who live in states where abortion is legal and bars medical malpractice insurance companies from suing an abortion clinic that provides “legal care,” according to a press release from Hochul’s office. It also enshrines “legal protections” for New York abortion providers, such as by prohibiting extradition for those who perform an abortion in a state where it’s legal.
The package also allows individuals to bring a claim against someone who has sued them or brought charges against them for facilitating, aiding, or obtaining an abortion. Such a provision has become increasingly relevant since Texas enacted a pro-life law with a novel enforcement mechanism that empowers private individuals to sue medical providers who perform or abet an abortion, rather than leave the task to the state legislature.
The last piece of legislation in the package directs the New York State Department of Health commissioner to study and issue a report on “limited service pregnancy centers.”
New York already codified Roe into state law under the state’s 2019 Reproductive Health Act. Several progressive states such as Colorado and California have taken similar action in the last year in anticipation of the Supreme Court ruling in favor of the petitioners in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, whose victory would overturn Roe.
“We’ve already seen the threats of anti-abortion violence, and the climate out there is just getting more extreme every single day, and it’s only going to get worse,” Hochul said at an event in Manhattan. “So we need to be ready for that as well. So that’s what we do here in New York. We don’t talk. We act. We don’t follow. We lead. We don’t wait. We get to work.”
Hochul, however, did not mention the recent string of violence targeting pro-life pregnancy centers throughout the country. On Monday, pro-abortion terrorists fire-bombed a pregnancy resource center in Gresham, Ore., that offers maternal care and information to expecting mothers, marking the fourth known incident of arson at a pro-life organization’s headquarters since the Supreme Court leak.
Activists have hurled incendiary devices into multiple facilities, gutting rooms with fire damage and in many cases vandalizing the walls with threatening messages like, “If abortions aren’t safe then neither are you.”
The governor of New York also neglected to mention, or condemn, the recent attempted assassination of Justice Kavanaugh, which was plotted on the grounds that he was part of the Supreme Court conservative majority that would overturn Roe and reject Second Amendment restrictions in upcoming cases.
