Abortion, gun votes likely to split Oregon House

Published 9:27 am Monday, May 1, 2023

The Oregon House set votes this week on abortion and firearms legislation that will divide the political parties, unlike multimillion-dollar packages for homelessness and housing and semiconductor manufacturing that largely united the parties during the first half of the 2023 session.

House Bill 2002, scheduled Monday, builds on Oregon’s 2017 law ensuring access to abortion and other reproductive and gender-affirming health care.

House Bill 2005, scheduled Tuesday, outlaws so-called ghost guns made with untraceable parts.

Both bills upon passage would go to the Senate, which then can take only up-or-down votes. They would not be sent to another committee.

If the vote on House Bill 2002 follows what happened with the Reproductive Health Equity Act in 2017, all Democrats will vote for it — except John Lively of Springfield — and all Republicans will vote against it.

If the vote on House Bill 2005 follows what happened with firearms legislation two years ago, most Democrats will vote for it — this bill is requested by Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum — and Republicans will vote against it.

House Speaker Dan Rayfield, D-Corvallis, agreed to schedule these bills as special orders of business. It was Rayfield who convened a work group last year just before the U.S. Supreme Court officially overturned abortion as a federal constitutional right (in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization) and returned the issue to states.

“The outcome of the vote is not going to be a surprise for most. A majority of Democrats supports these bills,” Rayfield told reporters on April 26. “But we have to respect the dialogue, we have to have the debate… It is important that the minority part have its voice be heard.”

House Bill 2002

Among key provisions of HB 2002:

• It says: “Every individual has a fundamental right to make decisions about the individual’s reproductive health, including the right to make decisions about the individuals’ reproductive health care, to use or refuse contraception, to continue the individual’s pregnancy and give birth or to terminate the individual’s pregnancy.”

• It creates a new crime of interference with a health care facility, set maximum penalties of 364 days in jail — one day short of a felony qualifying for state prison — and a fine of $6,250.

• It empowers individuals to go to court to enforce their rights.

• It safeguards gender-affirming health care for minors and others.

• It provides legal protection for providers who carry out procedures allowed under Oregon law, plus patients and others who assist them, even if they are from other states where such care may not be legal. It blocks Oregon courts and agencies from cooperating with out-of-state investigations.

The arguments

The Republican legislative leaders, Sen. Tim Knopp of Bend and Rep. Vikki Breese-Iverson of Prineville, have attempts to shift the debate to align with a parent-rights movement. Oregon voters have rejected six attempts between 1978 and 2018 to ban or limit abortion, including requirements for parental notification when minors are involved.

“Don’t be fooled, this is not an abortion or equality issue — this is a parental rights issue,” they said in an op-ed column. “This is the state of Oregon effectively telling you that the government understands the needs of your child better than you do. This is an extreme attack on the sacred relationship between a parent and a child.”

Republican legislative majorities did pass a parental notification requirement in 1999, but Democratic Gov. John Kitzhaber, a physician, vetoed it.

Sen. Elizabeth Steiner, a Democrat from Northwest Portland and a family practice physician at Oregon Health & Science University, said neither the practice nor the numbers support the Republican arguments.

“In very, very rare cases, when involving a parent or guardian could put a patient in danger, this bill upholds doctors’ duty to keep their patients of all ages safe,” she told reporters on April 26.

Of a total of 7,109 abortions recorded in Oregon in 2021, she said, just 14 involved someone under 15 — and 630 patients were between ages 15 and 19, including many 18- and 19-year-olds who would not be affected by any notice requirements.

At an earlier session with reporters on April 19, she said of Republicans who argued against the bill in the Legislature’s budget committee on April 13: “Our colleagues who are Republicans are putting out some extreme examples… But there was nothing that surprised me. I am a physician and I have been in this space for a really long time.”

House Majority Whip Andrea Valderrama, a Democrat from East Portland, was the bill’s floor manager. She said there was another dimension to this debate.

“Reproductive justice is racial justice. If we aren’t addressing the health disparities that I’ve heard so much about that continue to impact Black and Brown communities, we really aren’t going far enough,” said Valderrama, who was part of the work group that drafted the bill.

“And frankly, we aren’t listening to the Oregonians who have told us time and time again that access to this reproductive and gender-affirming care saves lives and is a fundamental right.”

House Bill 2005

House Bill 2005 builds on a 2021 law that requires safe storage of firearms, bars guns from the Capitol in Salem and the passenger terminal at Portland International Airport, and enables the governing boards of school districts, community colleges and universities to restrict guns in their buildings and grounds.

As for this bill, also drafted by a work group, it was amended so that the sale or transfer of firearms with untraceable parts — but not simple possession — would be punishable by a maximum fine of $1,000 on conviction for a first offense, 364 days in jail and a $6,250 fine for a second offense, and 10 years and a $250,000 fine for subsequent offenses.

However, after Sept. 1, 2024, possession of such a firearm, not just sales and transfers, would be punishable by the maximum penalties listed above.

The bill also would restrict possession of firearms by people ages 18 to 21 to six specified types.