Whitmer nixes extra insurance coverage for abortions 10 years after GOP passed mandate

Lansing — Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed legislation Monday on the Senate floor removing restrictions on health insurance coverage of abortion exactly ten years to the day after she railed against the Republicans-authored restrictions as Senate minority leader.

Whitmer's speech in 2013 opposing the legislation requiring women to pay for an additional insurance rider for abortion coverage gained widespread attention as she shared her story of being raped in college publicly for the first time.

The assault did not result in a pregnancy, but the East Lansing Democrat said the law left other rape survivors who became pregnant potentially without insurance coverage to terminate the pregnancy.

During her December 11, 2013 speech, Whitmer said the law effectively required to women to purchase "rape insurance" to cover an abortion in the event they were sexually assaulted.

Requiring women to purchase extra health insurance coverage for abortions, Whitmer said Monday, was "a dangerous and preposterous bill and they knew it."

"While this isn't about me, it is personal to me and so many Michigan women," Whitmer said.

Whitmer signed the repeal of the law she railed against ten years ago on the Senate floor inside the Senate's chamber, an unusual place for a governor to sign legislation.

Rep. Laurie Pohutsky, a Livonia Democrat who was a lead sponsor on the package of abortion-related bills, said the signing of the legislation underscores Michigan's commitment to bodily autonomy.

"We are saying definitively that Michigan is a state that values and protects the right of every person to determine their own reproductive future," Pohutsky said.

Pohutsky said Monday "the work isn't over" and that there are other abortion measures unable to move through the Legislature in recent months that could see further legislative debate or litigation.

More:Whitmer signs bills deregulating some aspects of abortion in Michigan

The Michigan Catholic Conference criticized the signing of the legislation, arguing the measures go beyond what the status quo voters were promised when they supported a year ago with the passage of Proposal 3, which enshrined abortion rights into the state constitution.

"While voters were told they would only be protecting the legality of abortion as it had been regulated under Roe v. Wade, the abortion lobby has leveraged passage of the new constitutional amendment to make Michigan an extreme outlier on abortion policy, far beyond what was status quo under Roe," said Rebecca Mastee, policy advocate for the Michigan Catholic Conference.

The bill signed Monday is the flagship legislation in a nine-bill package that removes several regulations on abortion in the wake of voters' passage of a ballot initiative last year that enshrined abortion in the state constitution.

The bill puts the language of the Reproductive Freedom for All constitutional amendment, Proposal 3, into state law and makes several additional repeals and changes to existing state law. It is tie-barred to eight separate bills that were signed into law last month.

Advocates of the legislation argue it codifies the changes introduced through the proposal. But opponents said it repeals common sense restrictions that ensure the health of women, such as surgical center mandates and a state-level partial birth abortion ban. A federal ban on partial birth abortion remains in place.

The bills signed last month largely repealed requirements for abortion clinics to be licensed as freestanding surgical centers in Michigan. Supporters of the repeal say they put unecessary and onerous building code restrictions on abortion clinics. The laws have been referred to as "TRAP laws," which stands for targeted restrictions on abortion providers.

The bill signed Monday inserts the language of the constitutional amendment into state law, repeals Michigan's partial birth abortion ban in full and voids a 92-year-old law that criminalizes the abortion of a "quick child" or a child that has started moving in the womb. The bill also nixes laws that require insurance providers to make customers pay for an additional rider for abortion coverage.

Supporters of the legislation were not able to get the full suite of repeals they wanted, in part due to at least one Democratic lawmaker who felt some of the measures went too far. Those repeals that aren't in the package include a repeal of a ban on Medicaid funding for abortions, a repeal of mandatory screening for coercion and and a repeal of the state's 24-hour waiting period ahead of an abortion.

The package of bills also did not include a repeal of the state's parental consent requirements for an abortion being sought by a minor, though prior versions of the legislation included it.

Pohutsky said those measures could see new life in the form of further legislative debate or litigation in the coming year. The prospect of litigation has been the subject of some controversy, as supporters of Proposal 3 last November dismissed concerns from opponents that the absolute constitutional right to abortion would nullify many Michigan's abortion regulations, such as the parental consent law.

Pohutsky, when asked whether the constitutional amendment conflicts with some of those laws, responded that there's a "solid argument to be made."

"A right is not actually a right if it is not accessible," Pohutsky told reporters. "There are still laws that are unfortunately on the books that do inhibit that right for people. I think that that's a solid argument to be made."

eleblanc@detroitnews.com