The Maryland General Assembly voted on Saturday to override Gov. Lawrence J. Hogan Jr.’s vetoes of abortion access and paid leave bills, enacting the measures into law.
The bills were among 10 measures a Democratic supermajority in the legislature enacted over the Republican governor’s objection on Saturday.
House Bill 937, titled the Abortion Care Access Act, was overridden in the House of Delegates by a vote of 90-46, and in the Senate by a vote of 29-15.
The bill will expand who can perform abortions in the state to include nurse practitioners, nurse midwives and physician assistants.
It will also provide $3.5 million in financial support to clinically train health care professionals to offer reproductive services. The bill will also make the state’s existing abortion care coverage under Medicaid permanent, and require private health insurance plans — with exceptions for those with religious or legal exemption — to cover abortion care without cost-sharing or deductibles.
In a veto letter, Hogan said the bill “endangers the health and lives of women by allowing non-physicians to perform abortions.”
Debate in the Senate on the bill was limited by an earlier cloture motion.
On the floor of the House, Minority Leader Haven Shoemaker (R-Carroll) called the bill the “most radical expansion of abortion in Maryland’s history in a state that already has some of the most liberal abortion laws in the country.”
Del. Emily Shetty (D-Montgomery), pushed back and said the only...
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