New laws target contentious topics
Gender, guns, abortion rules take effect in states
New state laws that took effect Saturday target some of the most divisive topics in America including abortion, gender and guns. Meanwhile, some motorists heading out for an extended Independence Day vacation may face higher taxes at the fuel pump.
The start of July marks the start of the budget year in most states and also is a common date for new laws to take effect.
Here’s a look at some of the new laws:
Gender
Over the last few years, Republicancontrolled states have been adopting laws to limit gender-affirming care for transgender minors, restrict school curriculums on human sexuality and specify which school bathrooms transgender people may use. Several of these laws took effect Saturday.
A ban on care including puberty blockers, gender-affirming hormone therapy and surgery for minors in South Dakota kicked in Saturday, as did a narrower one in Georgia allowing puberty blockers and for ongoing hormone treatment to continue.
A law that took effect in Indiana requires schools to notify a parent if a student requests a name or pronoun change at school. An Idaho law requires schools to tell parents when there are known changes in the student’s mental, emotional or physical well-being but does not mention gender identity as a specific reason.
Florida, Idaho and Kansas all have new laws barring transgender people from using the school restrooms associated with their gender identity
The Kansas law goes further, applying also to prisons, domestic violence shelters and rape crisis centers.
Abortion
Abortion will be barred after 12 weeks of gestation in most cases in North Carolina. The state, with a Republican-controlled legislature and a Democratic governor, became one of the last in the South to impose deeper abortion restrictions after last year’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that had protected the right to abortion nationally for nearly 50 years.
There are some exceptions to the law in cases of medical emergencies, pregnancy caused by rape or incest, or when a physician finds a life-limiting anomaly in the fetus.
Drugs
Several states are taking steps to expand the legal use of marijuana.
Recreational marijuana will become legal for adults ages 21 and older in Maryland, as a result of a constitutional amendment approved by voters last fall. About 100 stores that already have been licensed to sell medical marijuana will be the first to sell for recreational purposes, and people also can grow their own at home.
In Connecticut, where recreational cannabis has been available at licensed retail stores for about six months, it now will become legal for people to grow it, too.
In Minnesota, a new law allowing adults to possess and grow marijuana won’t take effect until Aug. 1. But the law’s budgetary provisions took effect Saturday.
Guns
Florida becomes the latest state to allow people to carry concealed guns without a permit. The new law comes five years after then-Gov. Rick Scott signed legislation restricting guns following a deadly school shooting in Parkland. Another new Florida law will prohibit credit card companies from tracking gun sales.
A law allowing concealed guns without a permit for those 21 and older also passed in Nebraska but doesn’t take effect until Sept. 10.
A new Vermont law requires a 72hour waiting period to buy firearms. It also expands the state’s “red flag” law to allow prosecutors, family and household members to ask a court to bar guns for particular people.
Babies
Beginning Saturday, Connecticut babies born into financial need will benefit from a state “baby bonds” program. Children whose birth is covered by a Medicaid program will have $3,200 invested automatically on their behalf that could be used later to buy a house in Connecticut, pay for education or job training, invest in a Connecticut business or save for retirement.
Similar programs have been enacted in Washington, D.C., and California, but they aren’t operational.
Immigration
A new Massachusetts law allows people in the country illegally to apply for a state driver’s license. Nineteen states and the District of Columbia now have such laws laws.
By contrast, a new Florida law voids driver’s licenses issued by other states to people in the country illegally.
Porn
Mississippi and Virginia will begin requiring pornography websites to verify that users are 18 or older in a move that supporters say will help protect children from sexually explicit material.
Taxes
Taxes will be rising in some states and falling in others.
The sales tax rate will drop in South Dakota and New Mexico. But a temporary exemption from a 1% grocery sales tax will end in Illinois.
Motorists will face higher gas taxes in more than a half-dozen states, including Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri and Virginia. Taxes for electric vehicle charging stations take effect in Montana and Utah, though Montana’s tax will initially apply only to new stations.
Washington will become the first state to deduct a tax from workers’ paychecks to fund a mandatory long-term care insurance program for residents who can’t live independently due to illness, injury or aging-related conditions.