Latest news with #HouseBill95
Yahoo
11-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
NC House panel votes to raise punishments for sending sexual content to minors, attacks on officials
The North Carolina Legislative Building (Photo: Clayton Henkel) A North Carolina House committee advanced two bills that would increase the punishment for exposing minors to sexually explicit material and threatening or assaulting public officials in a Tuesday meeting. Lawmakers in the House Judiciary 2 Committee voiced concerns that the language in the bills — House Bill 83 and House Bill 95 — could be overly broad and used to punish conduct outside their intended scope — including criticisms of lawmakers not intended to be 'real threats' and sexually explicit performances aimed at adult audiences only. HB 83, introduced to the committee by Rep. John Torbett (R-Gaston), raises the class of several crimes related to the dissemination of 'obscene' and 'harmful' material to minors and 'exhibition of harmful performances' and allowing courts to require those found guilty to register as sex offenders. The bill would also create a new felony offense described as 'habitual indecent exposure' for individuals found to have committed indecent exposure on three or more occasions. The largest change in the bill involves raising the dissemination of material or exhibition of performances that are 'harmful to minors' — defined as including sexually explicit nudity or sexual activity in violation of a 'prevailing community standard' — from a misdemeanor to a Class H felony, punishable by up to 39 months in prison. Torbett said the bill was prompted by a case in which a 16-year-old was sent 'harmful, vile, nasty material' by an adult man in South Carolina, but extradition was denied because the offense is classified only as a misdemeanor in North Carolina 'even though he was just across the border.' The minor's mother contacted Torbett, he said, and shared her outrage over what had happened. Rep. Yao Liu introduced an amendment to make explicit that the bill does not seek to punish performers themselves, if a parent brings a child to a show without their knowledge. 'My bill has nothing to do with strippers or exotic dancers,' Torbett said in response. The committee voted down the proposed amendment but approved a separate limiting felonies to ones in which sexual material is exchanged between individuals four or more years apart in age, mirroring statutory rape laws to avoid inadvertently punishing teen couples. While civil rights groups have opposed similar laws around content legislators define as 'harmful to minors' in other states out of concern they could be used to target drag and cabaret performers, no advocates attended Tuesday's committee meeting to speak out against the bill. Other states have used similar statutes to target librarians for criminal prosecution for checking out books considered by some as explicit — though North Carolina's law lists schools, libraries, churches, and other public institutions as well as their employees as exempt from prosecution so long as they are carrying out a 'legitimate function.' Rep. Deb Butler asked, 'Who defines harmful?' and suggested that reliance on community standards could lead to subjective judgments about offending material, but ultimately conceded, 'We'll just have to let the court define it when they see it.' HB 95, which was sponsored and explained by Rep. Keith Kidwell (R-Beaufort), stems in part from his own experience of being threatened at a Beaufort County polling place last year, when a constituent allegedly told him 'I'm just going to shoot you.' Kidwell said he did not understand why threats made by the same individual against locally elected Democratic officials were not also considered felonies as they are for state lawmakers. This bill would address that concern by classifying serious threats against local elected officials as felonies. The bill additionally heightens penalties around this conduct, raising the class of felonies around threats and attacks to public officials and granting judges greater latitude in imposing pretrial release restrictions on defendants in these cases. Even if officials do not directly receive or believe the threats being made, they can still rise to the level of felony offenses. 'In today's climate, I think most of us are going to agree when you're threatening an elected official, we need to take that serious,' Kidwell said. Rep. Charles Smith raised the possibility of including language that requires the threat to be imminent or create reasonable belief that it will actually occur, but ultimately did not propose an amendment to that effect. 'I'm not as concerned about how do I feel as to whether the threat was realistic,' Kidwell said, adding that the courts can make that determination. 'I've seen it where they threaten school board members, county commissioners, city council members — and to me, you know, I've always taken threats as real.' Also approved by the committee Tuesday was House Bill 188, by unanimous vote. The bill seeks to introduce new requirements for companies whose subscriptions or contracts automatically renew to protect consumers, on the grounds that many do not read the lengthy user agreements that mention them. Kidwell said he was moved to propose the bill when a constituent told her their lease automatically renewed without their knowledge, requiring them to continue living somewhere they did not wish to for an additional year.
Yahoo
17-02-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
Fertility preservation bill continues to second committee
Rep. Pamelya Herndon (D-Albuquerque) is co-sponsoring a bill to expand insurance coverage for fertility preservation treatment. (Photo by Danielle Prokop / Source NM) A bill requiring insurance companies to provide coverage of fertility preservation services to those with a disease or undergoing treatment that could lead to infertility passed its first committee Friday. Co-sponsor Rep. Pamelya Herndon (D-Albuquerque) presented House Bill 95 to the House Health and Human Services Committee Friday where it passed by a party-line vote of 6-3. It now heads to the House Commerce and Economic Development Committee. HB 95 would make changes to the Health Care Purchasing Act and the New Mexico Insurance Code to ensure health insurance extends to cover egg or sperm retrieval and preservation until the person is ready to start a family. If passed, the bill would go into effect on Jan. 1, 2026. Representatives from advocacy organizations Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains, Bold Futures, New Mexico Women's Agenda and NMVC Action Fund spoke in support of the bill. Charles Goodmacher, lobbyist for NMVC Action Fund, pointed out to committee members that fertility preservation services are already available in New Mexico, but only for those who have 'the wealth to pay the enormous fees involved. So it really is an issue about equity at its core.' Rep. Nicole Chavez (R-Albuquerque) questioned why the bill is not specific to cancer treatment, to which the sponsor and experts explained that other medical conditions and their treatment, such as sickle cell disease and advanced cases of lupus, can also impact fertility. 'Those are high-risk treatments that really pose a grave threat to future fertility,' Joyce Reinecke, executive director of the Alliance for Fertility Preservation, said to the committee. 'As a matter of equity, we would just not like to have those patients, who are essentially standing in the shoes of a cancer patient, kept away from these treatments and from future parenthood. But the bulk of the patients who would need these interventions are cancer patients.' Chavez ultimately voted against passing the bill through the committee. She said she understood the need for such insurance coverage, but worried that insurance premiums for state employees in particular would increase. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
