AUGUSTA, Maine (LifeSiteNews) — Social conservative leaders in Maine are sounding the alarm on planned legislation that would make the Pine Tree State a sanctuary for both abortion and gender “transitioning,” not only preventing future lawmakers from regulating either but effectively gutting the conscience rights of hospitals that don’t want their staff to participate.
On the Maine legislature’s website, LD 227 currently appears only as a brief “Concept Draft” with no actual contents beyond a note that it would “would enact provisions of law regarding health care in the State.” But the Christian Civic League of Maine and Maine Right to Life have obtained copies of a proposed draft amendment that would fill in the details, reportedly from Democrat state Rep. Anne Perry and state Sen. Donna Bailey, which would affirm a “legal right” to so-called “gender-affirming health care services and reproductive health care services” and much more.
The resulting bill would authorize civil suits for “for damages, punitive damages, equitable relief, injunctive relief or any other appropriate relief against another person who, whether or not acting under color of law, files or prosecutes” litigation or enforcement action meant to “deter, prevent, sanction or punish any person engaging in legally protected health care activity or aiding and assisting legally protected health care,” so long as “any act or omission involved […] occurs or is initiated in this State.”
READ: Maine’s radical new law allowing abortion up to birth takes effect
State law enforcement would be forbidden from cooperating in any way – court orders, subpoenas, summons, information sharing, or any other expenditure of public resources – with law enforcement from other states attempting to pursue such cases, unless required by federal law or other state laws.
It also forbids health care providers or insurers from taking any “adverse action” against patients or practitioners on the basis of abortion or gender “services,” including disciplinary action, refusal to provide service, or refusal to insure.
“Maine has NEVER seen anything as frightening as this toxic combination,” warns Maine Right to Life. “Of course, this is by design. The power brokers in Augusta are always hoping to catch us off guard.”
“Because there is no religious exception, it would mean that a Catholic healthcare organization or pro-life pregnancy center could be punished for disciplining an employee who participates in one of these morally objectionable services,” the Christian Civic League warns. “Malpractice insurers cannot increase rates or impose penalties on a doctor for providing gender identity/abortion services. This is interfering with the ability of insurers to appropriately factor in the risk of malpractice claims related to these procedures.”
A public hearing on the amendment was held Tuesday afternoon, March 5, which can be viewed here.
Abortion is legal in Maine up to the moment of birth for virtually any reason due to legislation signed last year by Democratic Gov. Janet Mills.
A significant body of evidence shows that “affirming” gender confusion carries serious harms, especially when done with impressionable children who lack the mental development, emotional maturity, and life experience to consider the long-term ramifications of the decisions being pushed on them, or full knowledge about the long-term effects of life-altering, physically transformative, and often irreversible surgical and chemical procedures. More than 80 percent of children outgrow gender dysphoria on their own by late adolescence, and even full “reassignment” surgery not only fails to resolve, but even exacerbates, gender-confused individuals’ heightened tendency to engage in self-harm and suicide, including by reinforcing their confusion and neglecting the actual root causes of their mental strife.
Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, pro-aborts have deployed numerous tactics to keep the abortion industry going, including embedding “rights” to abortion in state constitutions, facilitating easy interstate distribution of abortion pills, legal protection and financial support of interstate abortion travel, constructing new abortion facilities near borders shared by pro-life and pro-abortion states, making liberal states sanctuaries for those who want to evade or violate the laws of more pro-life neighbors.
READ: 89,000 babies have been saved from abortion since end of Roe: report