Our Work in Washington
Legislative Updates
During the Legislative Session, Legal Voice advocates for legislation that positively affects women and LGBTQ+ people, and defends against bills that threaten to roll back the progress we’ve made. These cover Legal Voice’s 2024 legislative priorities and updates for Washington State.
REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS
SB5241 / HB1263
Keep Our Care Act
This bill ensures business decisions like mergers don’t negatively impact your healthcare. Hospitals merge regularly without oversight, which can negatively impact the cost, quality, and access to necessary healthcare service. These impacts are particularly felt in rural communities and for Medicaid patients, many of whom are people of color. The bill would require the Attorney General to oversee mergers, ensuring they don’t reduce healthcare services, including reproductive, gender-affirming, and end-of-life care.
REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS
HB1151 / SB5204
Fertility Insurance Coverage
This bill requires health insurance to cover infertility. Infertility diagnosis and treatment is very expensive, directly linking the ability to grow your family to your income. This issue also has disproportionate racial impacts. Black and Indigenous people experience higher rates of infertility and lower rates of successful outcomes when undergoing infertility treatments which can be partially attributed to the prohibitive costs of services.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
HB2036 / SB6105
Strippers’ Bill of Rights
This bill establishes basic workers’ rights and protections for dancers. Pioneered by hundreds of organized current and former dancers, this bill changes the adult entertainment industry for the betterment of the whole workforce and community, but most especially, for dancers. The bill increases workplace safety and economic justice with measures such as mandatory trainings on sexual harassment, dedicated security personnel, and regulations on exploitative fees charged to dancers.These changes will reduce harm, increase resources, and address extractive and unsafe power dynamics and practices.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
SB 5486 / HB 1473
Tax on Excessive Wealth
This bill makes our tax code more equitable. This tax for Washington’s ultra-rich residents, fewer than 800 people, would tax all financial properties (think stocks and bonds, not penthouses and yachts) above $250 million at 1% each year. Funds would pay for affordable housing, disability services, education, and tax rebates for working families – all necessary to achieve our vision of a just world where people can thrive and grow their families in sustainable ways.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
HB1095 / SB5109
Unemployment Insurance for Undocumented Workers
This bill extends unemployment insurance benefits to undocumented workers. The pandemic highlighted the need for strong social safety nets so that we can all thrive and provide for ourselves and our families. Undocumented workers are structurally excluded from many public support programs due solely to immigration status, despite paying over $300 million in state and local taxes annually in Washington state. This bill ensures that people can access support that should be available to every resident of our state.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
SB 5793 / HB1991
Expanding Paid Sick Leave
This bill extends sick leave beyond direct family members. Our connections and community extend so much further than the nuclear family, and our opportunities to care for them should too. This bill aligns definitions of family with the Paid Family Medical Leave program policy and includes coverage for “someone who has an expectation to rely on you for care – whether you live together or not.” This expansion is vital for immigration and queer communities, as well as people living in intergenerational or extended families.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
HB1045
Evergreen Guaranteed Basic Income Pilot
This bill proposes a pilot program to prove that a key anti-poverty strategy works. This program would provide consistent, unrestricted cash payments to improve the lives of eligible Washingtonians with low incomes and experiencing life conditions such as homelessness or domestic violence, for two years. We know that access to reproductive rights is meaningless if people cannot afford them, and this program is a key strategy to address a very basic need across all our communities.
BUDGET REQUESTS
Health Equity
for Immigrants
This will supplement funding for key health programs for undocumented immigrants. This request would fund an additional 25,000 people to access a Medicaid-like program for health insurance, as well as additional funding to community based organizations to conduct outreach and ensure people know what benefits are available to them.
