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Maine’s Democrat-dominated legislature passed a bill Friday that would shield abortion and gender transition surgeons from facing lawsuits for providing services to minors.
The bill, LD 227, protects anyone aiding or offering medical services that are unlawful in other states, like abortion and gender transition surgical procedures or hormones. It would also create a private right of action for damages against law enforcement, prosecutors and other officials in states enforcing their respective state laws – even laws whose constitutionality has been confirmed by federal appellate courts.
With the state’s Democratic Gov. Janet Mills expected to sign the bill into law, Maine voters must act to elect enough Republicans to “take back at least one chamber” in November’s election, Republican state Rep. Laurel Libby told Fox News Digital in an interview Thursday.
“That’s really the only way to make significant change in the face of this legislation,” Libby said. “They’re stripping their parental rights, and that definitely has been overwhelmingly unpopular with Maine people.”
MAINE CONSIDERS BILL THAT WOULD ESTABLISH ‘LEGAL RIGHT’ TO ABORTION, TRANSGENDER SURGICAL PROCEDURES
Maine lawmakers passed LD 227 last week. It now heads to the governor’s desk. (Darin Oswald/Idaho Statesman/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)
Maine’s LD 227 is part of a broader effort nationwide by blue state lawmakers to shield medical providers performing abortions or transgender surgical procedures on minors who do not have full parental support. More than a dozen states have shield laws in place protecting abortion providers from out-of-state investigations where abortion is illegal.
It would also prohibit “interference” with abortion or sex change procedures, legally protect medical workers from facing lawsuits and could potentially permit concealment of medical records from plaintiffs seeking legal action against a provider.
Republicans who oppose the bill caution it might inadvertently allow for the “kidnapping” of adolescents in states that have heavier restrictions to undergo these procedures if they are taken across state lines to Maine.
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Pro-choice demonstrators rally for abortion rights in front of the U.S. Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., in 2022. LD 227 passed in the Maine legislature last week. (Jose Luis Magana/AFP /AFP via Getty Images)
The bill comes after 16 attorneys general, led by Tennessee’s Jonathan Skrmetti, sent a letter to Gov. Janet Mills, Attorney General Aaron Frey and state legislature leadership denouncing the bill as a “novel effort at state-sanctioned culture war litigation tourism.”
Abortion is legal in Maine up until full term of a woman’s pregnancy. Last year, the legislature also approved some transition medication for 16- and 17-year-olds, such as puberty blockers and hormones, without parental consent.
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A transgender flag unfurled on a pole. LD 227 would safeguard transgender surgeries for children and protect providers from lawsuits. (Getty Images)
At least 23 states restrict or ban transgender surgical procedures for minors. Proponents of Maine’s proposed legislation, including Planned Parenthood, argue it will provide much needed protection for medical providers in the state.
Fox News’ Brianna Herlihy contributed to this report.
Jamie Joseph is a writer who covers politics. She leads Fox News Digital coverage of the Senate.
