Proposed bill would safeguard abortion and gender-affirming care in Connecticut

By Emma May | UConn Jour­nal­ism
May 15, 2025

A new bill to strength­en gen­der-affirm­ing care and abor­tion pro­tec­tions for both health­care providers and patients has been intro­duced in the Con­necti­cut House. 

House Bill 7135 is a con­tin­u­a­tion of the shield law signed in 2023, which pro­tects women seek­ing abor­tion ser­vices in Con­necti­cut whose legal res­i­dence is in anoth­er state. Sup­port­ers in the Gen­er­al Assem­bly are look­ing to estab­lish fur­ther pro­tec­tions for the health­care providers who per­form abor­tions and gen­der-affirm­ing care, includ­ing per­form­ing tele­health con­sul­ta­tions, so  they would not face any legal ram­i­fi­ca­tions from out­side states.  

“What is hap­pen­ing in this coun­try under the cur­rent admin­is­tra­tion and in var­i­ous states is just trag­ic,” State Rep. Jil­lian Gilchrest, D‑West Hart­ford said. “Open­ing the door to all for med­ical­ly accu­rate and com­pre­hen­sive health­care to indi­vid­u­als is vital­ly impor­tant.”  

The Gen­er­al Assem­bly devel­oped the Repro­duc­tive Rights Cau­cus after the over­turn of the his­toric U.S. Supreme Court case Roe vs. Wade back in 2022, Gilchrest said. The cau­cus want­ed to be a cham­pi­on for women’s rights not just in Con­necti­cut, but for women in the coun­try, Gilchrest said.  

The pri­or­i­ties of the cau­cus include expand­ing access to repro­duc­tive health­care on pub­lic uni­ver­si­ty state cam­pus­es and align­ing fer­til­i­ty insur­ance cov­er­age with a med­ical stan­dard of care.  

There are 12 states that have total abor­tion bans in the coun­try with extreme­ly lim­it­ed excep­tions, and four states that have a six-week-ban. This  Con­necti­cut bill will affect the women in those 16 states if they wish to come to  Con­necti­cut to get an abor­tion. 

Gretchen Raf­fa, the chief pol­i­cy and advo­ca­cy offi­cer for Planned Par­ent­hood of South­ern  New Eng­land, said in writ­ten tes­ti­mo­ny that the bill is nec­es­sary for prop­er and essen­tial  med­ical care. 

“No one’s health should be com­pro­mised, or health care access denied because of who they are or where they live,” Raf­fa said. 

Regard­less of where a per­son lives, they can look for repro­duc­tive and gen­der affirm­ing health­care vir­tu­al­ly. 

“This bill also says any­one who seeks care via tele-health will have their infor­ma­tion  pro­tect­ed,” Gilchrest said. “This goes for our health­care providers as well.”  

More than 50% of abor­tions are med­ical abor­tions in the Unit­ed States, and this num­ber has been increas­ing through­out the past decade, accord­ing to Pew Research and the CDC.  

“Women can access repro­duc­tive health­care on tele-health and be pre­scribed a med­ical abor­tion,” Gilchrest said. They do not need to have an in-per­son appoint­ment.” 

Women could be in Con­necti­cut or out-of-state, and all the doc­tors would need to do is pre­scribe the chem­i­cal abor­tion pill and send it to the cor­rect loca­tion, Gilchrest said.  

Some Uni­ver­si­ty of Con­necti­cut stu­dents, such as Rachel Verte­feuille, a 20-year-old senior at UConn, said she oppos­es the pas­sage of the bill.  

“I think that if women are this des­per­ate to get an abor­tion, they should move to a state that allows it,” Verte­feuille said. “Seek­ing an abor­tion over tele-heath can be incred­i­bly dan­ger­ous to women’s health and their life.” 

Stu­dents for Life of Amer­i­ca is an anti-abor­tion group whose mis­sion is to abol­ish abor­tion  in the Unit­ed States, includ­ing all forms of chem­i­cal abor­tion, and it has tak­en a firm  oppos­ing stance to this bill.  

“One in 20 women end up in the ER after a chem­i­cal abor­tion, and it’s ter­ri­ble that doc­tors  could just pre­scribe these pills through tele-health,” Jes­si­ca Pow­er, New Eng­land region­al direc­tor of Stu­dents for Life of Amer­i­ca said. “This bill does not pro­tect women at all.” 

Abor­tion advo­cates have dis­put­ed the use of ER sta­tis­tics. The 2021 study that looked at the issue was lat­er retract­ed after an inde­pen­dent review found issues with its analy­sis.  

The bill is opposed by some Repub­li­cans in the leg­is­la­ture.

“With many of the bills that we do, I think this def­i­nite­ly could be a case that could go to the  Supreme Court, and require a deci­sion from them,” State Rep. Cara Pavalock‑D’Amato (R‑Bristol) said.  

Abor­tion and gen­der-affirm­ing care are con­sid­ered togeth­er under this bill.  How­ev­er, these are usu­al­ly sep­a­rate med­ical issues,  Pavalock‑D’Amato said. 

“Insur­ance billing has their own codes and plans because of dif­fer­ent ser­vices,” Paval­ock D’Amato said. “Since there are two dif­fer­ent plans, I think there should be two dif­fer­ent  bills.” 

There are six states that have com­plete bans on gen­der-affirm­ing care in the Unit­ed States,  mak­ing the prac­tice a felony crime, accord­ing to the non­prof­it Move­ment Advance­ment Project. Con­necti­cut, along  with 13 oth­er states, has a shield act, which would pro­tect peo­ple from these states when  look­ing for this care, accord­ing to the project.  

If the bill pass­es, providers would be pro­tect­ed from any legal action states may want to  take against them for pro­vid­ing gen­der-affirm­ing care, espe­cial­ly if it is ille­gal in their state.  

“I think any state will­ing to stand up and rec­og­nize [the LGBTQ+ com­mu­ni­ty] and sup­port them in seek­ing health­care is impor­tant,” Gilchrest said.  

Cason Gen­ovese, a UConn stu­dent and Tik­Tok influ­encer, said he sup­ports the bill. He posts reg­u­lar­ly about his life expe­ri­ences as a trans­gen­der man and uses the  #21yearsyoung on each post to bring vis­i­bil­i­ty to the young trans­gen­der com­mu­ni­ty. 

“I think it is great that Con­necti­cut can become a green flag state for not just peo­ple seek­ing affirm­ing care, but also for providers that want to prac­tice med­i­cine and serve the trans com­mu­ni­ty this way,” Gen­ovese, 21, said.  

Chris­tine Reb­stock, a self-pro­claimed “old school” trans­sex­u­al and rights advo­cate in Con­necti­cut, tes­ti­fied against the bill. 

“You are active­ly harm­ing chil­dren, LGB, and women with this dis­turb­ing and relent­less legal roll­out,” Reb­stock said. “Activist-lob­by­ists have deeply mis­led Con­necti­cut  politi­cians, and we are fac­ing cul­tur­al dis­as­ter.”  

The bill would pro­tect gen­der-affirm­ing care for peo­ple who have gen­der dys­pho­ria and  gen­der incon­gru­ence. The bill does not touch on con­ver­sion ther­a­py, which tries to change a person’s sex­u­al or  gen­der iden­ti­ty using psy­cho­analy­sis, behav­ior mod­i­fi­ca­tion or intense coun­sel­ing.  

There are 23 states includ­ing Con­necti­cut and Wash­ing­ton D.C. that have banned con­ver­sion ther­a­py for  minors across the state, accord­ing to the Move­ment Advance­ment Project. 

Con­necti­cut House Bill 7135 would go into effect on July 1 if it pass­es and is signed into law by  Gov. Ned Lam­ont.