The Score Card

Out of 34 bills that I tracked one on made it to the governor’s desk...

HB 6913

AN ACT PROHIBITING LONG-TERM CARE FACILITIES FROM

DISCRIMINATING AGAINST LONG-TERM CARE FACILITY

RESIDENTS.

To prohibit long-term care facilities or long-term care facility staff

from discriminating against any long-term care facility resident on

the basis of such resident's actual or perceived sexual orientation,

gender identity or expression or human immunodeficiency virus

status.

Flamed out early in the session…

SJ-35

RESOLUTION PROPOSING A STATE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT CONCERNING DISCRIMINATION ON THE BASIS OF SEX UNDER THE EQUAL PROTECTION CLAUSE.

Another flame out… the bill that my committee worked on. The bill took all the hate crime statutes and combined them all into one location in the criminal statute. But what happened was what I warned of happening… poison pill amendment.

Hate Crime Consolidation Bill Dies In Senate

CT News Junkie

by Jamil Ragland

June 5, 2025

A bill that would have moved all of Connecticut’s hate crimes to one place in the penal code sailed through the House of Representatives but had not been called for a debate in the Senate before the 2025 legislative session ended Wednesday.

House Bill 6872 would have consolidated the state’s various hate crime statutes into one place and also would have defined various hate crimes and the penalties associated with their violation. The bill was the result of work done by the Connecticut Hate Crimes Advisory Council, which recommended the consolidation effort.

Hey… but the Republicans don’t believe in bias crimes… they believe it is the right to discriminate! Back in 2011 we tried the same thing… not adding anything to the law just combining them. But he Republicans kept trying to add one amendment after another to gut the bill, well this time it was and amendment to add the police to the protected classes. Do you believe that? The police as a protected class!

The bill sat on the House calendar from April 24 all the way to Tuesday, June 3, when it was debated for more than 90 minutes before it was tabled. The main sticking point was an amendment offered by Rep. Craig Fishbein, R-Wallingford, that would make police a protected class in the bill. When the House picked it back up Wednesday afternoon, Fishbein withdrew his amendment, saying that he hoped the issue would be revisited in the next session.

Talk… talk… talk… it to death.

“I think the very important part that the chairman does highlight is the consolidation, which is a problem to begin with,” he said. “The commission needs to have a comprehensive document to look at to make recommendations and the problem right now is hate crimes are all through the statutes. So what we’ve done here today is one of the governor’s goals … to consolidate.”

However, despite the unanimous vote in the House the bill was not called in the Senate before the session concluded at midnight Wednesday.

Let’s face, when it comes to discrimination… the Republicans are all for it.

Note: 1 out of of 34 seems like a slim win but many of the bill s that I tracked were anti-LGBTQ+ proposed bills. Also many bills get combined into other bills as amendments. So a batting average of 30 isn't bad.

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The photo was from when I was from my desk on Board St when I was interning for my MSW at She Leads Justice (Formally known as the Connecticut Women’s Education and Legal Fund, or CWEALF)