New Jesey lawmakers will consider legislation to protect healthcare for transgender people and those who provide it, a measure first proposed nearly two years ago that supporters rallied to support earlier this year in Trenton.
The Senate health committee is scheduled to take testimony and vote Monday on the bill, which would provide criminal and civil legal protections for healthcare providers who offer services related to gender dysphoria in New Jersey and to their patients. The measure also addresses legal protections for reproductive healthcare.
The news was welcome to Jane Buchanan, an advocate with the Transgender Rights Coalition of New Jersey who has a son who is transgender.
NJ hospital program credited as ‘game-changer’ for connecting people to services
“We’re extremely excited that the bill is being heard,” Buchanan told the New Jersey Monitor.
The coalition staged a rally in January at the Statehouse in Trenton to urge lawmakers to act. The bill would codify in state statute protections in an executive order former Gov. Phil Murphy signed in 2023.
“We’ve been hoping, we’ve been advocating,” Buchanan said. “We’re happy it is moving.”
Versions of the proposal in the state Senate and Assembly have amassed dozens of Democratic sponsors since it was introduced in June 2024, but it had yet to be posted for a vote in either house. The Senate bill is sponsored by Senate President Nick Scutari (D-Union) and Sen. Teresa Ruiz (D-Essex).
Advocates say the legal protections are particularly important given ongoing efforts to block care by President Trump, who signed an executive order his first day in office declaring the federal government would only recognize two genders. His administration has threatened to withhold funding from hospitals that provide certain types of healthcare to transgender minors, an order that was blocked by a federal judge in March.
The pressure led multiple hospitals around the country to suspend that care for young people, treatments that can include puberty blockers, hormone therapy, and mental health support. In New Jersey, several hospitals stopped accepting new patients and Atlantic Health told parents of trans kids already in treatment services would also be suspended, before reversing this decision.
Ruiz has said the bill is necessary given the fear and uncertainty facing providers and patients nationwide. Bill sponsor Sen. Andrew Zwicker (D-Middlesex) agreed.
“Give the attacks from the Trump administration on both reproductive health care and gender affirming care, and what we are seeing with certain Republican-led states, it is time for New Jersey to step up and defend legally protected healthcare activities,” he told the New Jersey Monitor on Thursday.
Vidhi Goel, a Central Jersey mom with a trans son, also welcomed news that the bill would be heard.
“Reproductive health care and gender-affirming care are rooted in the same fundamental right — to make decisions about your own body and live as your full self. As a parent who has lived this, I know that when our kids have access to the care they need, they flourish,” she told the New Jersey Monitor in an email.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES.
