Where abortion providers and patients are protected from out-of-state investigations

Colorado Democratic Gov. Jared Polis signed a trio of reproductive health care bills, including shield legislation, into law last year. Seventeen states and Washington, D.C., have such statutes on the books. (Sara Wilson/Colorado Newsline)

Since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the federal right to abortion nearly two years ago, more than a dozen state legislatures have enacted laws that protect abortion providers and patients from out-of-state investigations.

These statutes — shield laws — are typically passed in Democratic-led states. “It’s the states saying ‘We define abortion and gender-affirming care as protective health care, and we’re not going to participate in any extradition or investigations that don’t,’” said Rachel Rebouché, a reproductive health policy expert and the dean of the Temple University Beasley School of Law in Pennsylvania.

Tallies of shield efforts sometimes include executive orders. Excluding those, 17 states and Washington, D.C., have codified protections for reproductive health care providers and patients, according to a States Newsroom review.

California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Vermont and Washington state have statutes safeguarding abortion access. Many of these states combined gender-affirming care protections in their laws, too.

Governors in Arizona, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island have issued executive orders declaring that state agencies won’t cooperate in extraditions or investigations into reproductive health care services. But those states don’t have parallel shield laws on the books.

In July 2022, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed Executive Order 2022-4, which says Michigan refuses to extradite pregnant people who travel from out of state to Michigan seeking reproductive health care. It also protects providers of legal abortion in Michigan from being extradited for prosecution in another state for offering reproductive health care.

“After the overturn of Roe v Wade and the ensuing implementation of a series of extreme bans on abortion that criminalize women and medical professionals across the country, visitors to Michigan must know that they can access reproductive health care within our borders without fear of extradition.” Whitmer said in a statement at the time. “I will stand up for all women, even if their local and statewide leaders refuse to. Michigan must remain a place where a person’s basic rights are preserved.”

In Virginia, the lone state in the Southeast that hasn’t restricted abortion further since Roe v. Wade fell, Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin recently vetoed a shield measure passed by the Democratic-led General Assembly.

“The extradition process among the states has a long and successful history within an established legal framework required by the U.S. Constitution,” Youngkin said in a statement explaining the rejection. “This bill would undermine that framework and disrupt the extradition laws in all fifty states.”

Elsewhere, the Pennsylvania House passed a shield bill in November, but the measure didn’t move in the Senate. Similar legislation was defeated in New Hampshire earlier this year.

In Rhode Island, the Health Care Provider Shield Act would protect people seeking and offering reproductive and transgender health care services. The bill is scheduled for consideration in the Senate on Thursday. Meanwhile, a House committee recommended the bill be held for further study.

While these laws haven’t necessarily been tested in court, 16 Republican attorneys generals have suggested that shield statutes violate the U.S. Constitution, specifically the Full Faith and Credit Clause. Rebouché said the clause is a “somewhat narrow doctrine” that ensures final court judgements in one state are effective in other states.

Tennessee GOP Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti sent a letter to Maine officials on behalf of the group of AGs in March, when lawmakers were debating a shield law, arguing against the proposal’s constitutionality. “We have enough disagreement in America these days without state governments reaching outside their borders to cause trouble in other states,” he said in a statement.

All the attorneys general who spoke out against the Maine law preside over states with abortion restrictions.

But Democratic Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey dismissed those threats in a rebuttal, calling them “meritless” and an intimidation tactic. Gov. Janet Mills, also a Democrat, signed the legislation last week, making her state the latest with a shield law protecting reproductive and gender-affirming care providers and patients.

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