This Week in Statehouse Action: New Laws, Who Dis? edition
sorry, must have lost your bill number when I switched
Happy New Year!
…fiscal new year, that is.
In the statehouse space, July marks the beginning of the new fiscal year in every state except Alabama, Michigan, New York, and Texas.
That fiscal year jump-off is also when most state laws take effect.
So, the beginning of July means stuff is changing in a lot of states.
Let’s take a quick look.
The good:
Most bars in California now have to make kits for drug testing drinks (for roofies and the like) available for free or minimal cost.
In Virginia, it’s now illegal to declaw cats (absent some specific medical need to do so, like injury or infection).
Would you believe I’m about to say something positive about Tennessee?
Hold on to your butts
A first-of-its-kind law offering protections against generative AI in music just took effect in the Volunteer State.
The new law bans unauthorized impersonation of performers’ voices by artificial intelligence.
While it might seem a little against type for a groundbreaking AI restriction to originate in Tennessee, the name of the bill is a big tipoff as to why it’s a big deal there:
The Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security (ELVIS) Act updates the state’s old right of publicity law that protected artists’ names, photographs, or likenesses.
On a related note, in Colorado, it’s now illegal to air campaign ads with audio, video, and other content generated using artificial intelligence without featuring prominent disclosures regarding the false depictions.
Violators face civil penalties.
The bad:
In Kansas, anyone undergoing an abortion procedure has to tell their provider which of 11 prescribed reasons is most relevant to their decision to get an abortion.
Ostensibly, answering the question is optional, but if patients refuse to answer, their refusal is recorded in a state database.
Other personal information patients will have to divulge to providers includes whether they’ve recently experienced domestic violence and whether they consider their living situation safe and stable.
Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly vetoed this bill, of course, but Republicans in the legislature narrowly overrode it.
Legal challenges to this intrusive law are already underway, and a Planned Parenthood spokesperson says that the Kansas health department has stated that it will not enforce it, “for now.”
Also in Kansas – and also law because of a successful veto override vote – “abortion coercion” is now a crime.
In fact, it’s a straight-up felony to “coerce” someone to get an abortion against their will.
Two GOP-controlled states – Idaho and Tennessee – created a new crime of so-called “abortion trafficking,” which is when you take literally any action to help someone who’s not 18 get an abortion.
Both laws are currently tied up in litigation.
A nasty new law in Georgia makes challenging a voter’s eligibility easier than ever (Republicans had already made it wicked easy) by not placing any limits on what factors can be used to make a claim that someone shouldn’t be allowed to vote.
The law also allows voters to be removed from the rolls up until 45 days before an election, which sure looks like a clear violation of the National Voter Registration Act, which bans removal of voters within 90 days of a federal election.
The ugly:
In Florida, localities are now banned from implementing city or county ordinances that would protect outdoors workers, like folks in construction or farming, from heat by mandating water or cooling breaks or other protective measures.
It occurs to me that Republicans believe in this weird “sandwich” theory of government power.
Federal government: bad.
State government: good and should be big enough to step on any locality with the temerity to do anything different than what we want.
Local/city/county government: bad.
Here’s one for the Conservatives Want To See What The Current SCOTUS Will Let Them Get Away With file (also, TW: CSA).
On July 1, Tennessee joined a super short but likely-to-grow list of states (the other being Florida) that impose the death penalty on anyone convicted of child rape — apparently unconstitutionally, but that might be a temporary thing.
In 2008, SCOTUS ruled 5-4 in Kennedy v. Louisiana that the death penalty was a disproportionate and unconstitutional penalty for sexual assault of a minor that did not result in a victim's death.
Last year, emboldened by the new conservative Supreme Court supermajority, Florida passed the first post-Kennedy child rape death penalty law.
Seriously, Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis straight up said, “We do not believe the Supreme Court in its current iteration would uphold [the Kennedy decision].”
Other red states are considering similar bills that they believe the current Court will smile on.
Just this year, such legislation was proposed in Idaho, South Carolina, and South Dakota.
Because most legislative sessions are done for the year, there won’t be a ton of this kind of policy news in the coming months, but because statehouses are where this stuff moves, I’ll keep you updated on the latest (and circle back on any interesting stuff that might have slipped my radar here).
But the start of July brings with it escalating campaign efforts, and with thousands of state legislative candidates on the ballot and dozens of ballot measures in the offing, there will be no shortage of stuff to cover.
Coming soon to a newsletter near you: Democratic prospects in various states and how ballots are shaping up in Arizona (primary: July 30), Kansas (primary: Aug. 6), Michigan (primary: Aug. 6), Wisconsin (primary: Aug. 13), and beyond!
But in the meantime, have yourself a safe and happy Fourth of July.
Thanks for hanging in as you kick off the holiday, and stay rad!