Texas Senate committee advances trans sports ban and medical abortion roadblock amid COVID-19 surge

AUSTIN – With the House of Representatives unable to do business without a quorum and amid a spike in COVID-19 cases related to the Delta variant, a Texas Senate committee pushed ahead with the hearings on Sunday and two of Governor Greg Abbott tabled prioritized bills in the second special session that began on Saturday.

The Texas House was not quorate on Saturday because Democrats are said to be still in Washington, DC to lobby for federal voting legislation. In addition, about 10 members had tested positive for COVID-19. Only 81 of the 150 members of the House of Representatives attended the Texas Capitol on Saturday.

More Republicans are out on Covid today, around 10. They need to be quarantined for 2 weeks … there will likely not be a quorum in Abbott’s second suppression session. pic.twitter.com/JscpVWZlrd

– Representative Ana-Maria Ramos (@ Ramos4Texas) August 7, 2021

Two controversial issues were on the Senate agenda on Sunday afternoon: a proposed ban on the participation of transgender students in UIL sports and legislation aimed at restricting access to abortion drugs.

Brownsville Democrat Eddie Lucio Jr.’s Senate Bill 4 would prohibit what some lawmakers have termed “dispatch abortions,” a practice of mailing abortion-inducing drugs to people who wish to terminate pregnancies.

During the pandemic, a change in Food and Drug Administration guidelines allowed people seeking an abortion to receive the medication in the mail without a personal doctor’s visit. Critics of the policy change that pushed the legislation say it creates a safety issue for the people who take the drug.

Although he said he didn’t like that an abortion was still going to take place, Lucio said the legislation would prevent complications he believed could arise if the drugs were administered without the presence of the health care provider.

“As you all know well, I am a pro-life lawmaker who believes in the sanctity of life,” said Lucio. “However, this bill is a little different … the bill tries to ensure that there aren’t two deaths instead of one.”

But Blake Rocap, a healthcare attorney for Texas-based abortion rights group Avow, said during public testimony that the legislation would not change the fact that people seeking an abortion are still subject to abortion care restrictions under current Texas law , including a sonogram less than 24 hours before the termination of the pregnancy, which must be done in a doctor’s office.

Despite that statement, GOP Senator Charles Perry of Lubbock said, “We have yet to pass this bill because it reaffirms our commitment to women’s health.”

During the hearing, Edgewood introduced GOP Sen. Bob Hall to two hypothetical situations of potential abuse that he believes could arise under the current situation: a family member ordering the drug for a pregnant woman and unwittingly giving it to her, or the sex trafficker who enforce the drugs on women who abuse them.

However, Rocap said he feared the bill could affect the quality of care and thereby hurt women, as it would effectively prevent doctors from performing medical abortions he believes are safe for patients aged between 7 and 10 years old Week pregnant. He also said this could have a chilling effect on doctors who offer this type of care, as they could face a crime for not reporting complications unrelated to the abortion in a future pregnancy.

“If you were a doctor in Texas doing abortion treatment and then 10 years later your patient with a pregnancy to carry to term was pregnant again and had a non-supply complication, you could be charged with a crime in the state prison for failing to report this complication, ”explained Rocap. “That seems a little monstrous to me and I hope the committee would agree.”

Transgender youth

Also being considered as Sunday was a bill banning transgender youth from participating in UIL sports. According to this legislation, athletes were only allowed to participate in teams that correspond to their biological sex.

Perry, who drafted Senate Bill 2, said the intent of his law is to ensure that cisgender Texas women who participate in sports have a fair chance of success. Several female athletes testified that they feared their performance would be compromised if they had to compete with transgender women who they believed were biologically stronger.

During the regular session of the Legislature, dozens of Texans stood up to testify against an identical bill. Her hours of testimony reflected the position that LGBTQ youth are harmed by constantly questioning their identity.

However, the Sunday witness testimony about the bill only lasted about an hour and a half.

Prior to the hearing, Equality Texas, an LGBTQ rights organization, announced that it would boycott the committee’s hearing. During the public testimony, two representatives from the organization stated the notable absence of members of the LGBTQ community.

“Other witnesses, more qualified than me, will testify to the trauma these children experience every time they are asked to plead with the government for their humanity at one of these hearings,” said Holt Lackey, chairman of Equality Texas. “Because this committee already knows where our members stand and has already shown that they don’t care, we are not asking them to take part today.”

Both bills were tabled on Sunday, but it is unclear when or if they will be heard by the House of Representatives due to a lack of quorum.

Similar versions of both bills were passed by the Senate during the first special session convened, but got stuck because of the quorum suspension.

“It feels like marmot day,” Perry said before taking the bill.

This time, however, the impending presence of COVID-19 was stronger than during the previous session. Several members of the Health and Human Services Committee wore masks, and senators noted that public testimony may have decreased due to fear of the virus.

Hall said during a committee hearing at its regular meeting that he hadn’t received a vaccine in years. On Saturday he was present at a protest against vaccine mandates in Dallas.

Senator César Blanco, D-El Paso, requested that the committee accept previous public testimony for and against identical bills in previous sessions.

“We are in a COVID surge,” he said. “People are scared and frankly it was short-term.”

Chairman Lois Kolkhorst said the application was not in order.

[ad_1]