Kentucky bill graveyard: anti-DEI, abortion exceptions, constitution changes & more
Abortion exceptions, DEI, a litany of proposed constitutional amendments, a tax exemption for diapers, an elected state school board — these were among the many bills this legislative session that garnered a lot of discussion but didn’t make it over the hump in the final days before the veto break.
Some of those seemed like they were on their way to final passage, particularly one bill related to the primary social issue of the legislative session: diversity, equity and inclusion.
The Senate and the House both separately filed bills limiting DEI trainings and offices in postsecondary education, referring to the practices as “discriminatory concepts.”
After passage in the Senate, the House inserted much of its own House Bill 9 into Senate Bill 6. On the final day, the Senate Republican caucus did not agree with the changes and decided to punt on considering the bill.
“It’s been contentious within our caucus, and that’s about all I can say. That’s all I will say,” Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, said on the last night of session before the veto break.
The University of Kentucky, as well as the state Council on Postsecondary Education, opposed the bills.
Republicans in large part expressed support for some kind of measure limiting the practice — it’s been a talking point for conservatives across the nation — while Democrats stood against it. The sticking point for the Senate caucus was what final form such a limitation would look like.
Any bills passed the final two days of session — April 12 and 15 — could be vetoed by Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear, leaving lawmakers adjourned and unable to override his decision.
Here are some other notable bills unlikely to make it over the finish line during the 2024 General Assembly.
Regulating adult-oriented businesses
Senate Bill 147 from Sen. Lindsey Tichenor, R-Smithfield, would’ve relegated “adult entertainment” businesses, as well as commercial use locations hosting “performances with explicitly sexual conduct,” to be at least 933 feet away from certain locations where children might be, like libraries, schools, houses of worship and parks.
That distance is the average length of a city block, Tichenor has said, and the businesses targeted by the bill include adult arcades, video stores, theater and adult cabaret. It wouldn’t have applied to all drag performances, only ones containing “explicitly sexual conduct.”
The need for the bill, Tichenor said throughout the session, was because this type of content presents “a wide variety of adverse secondary effects, including an increase in crime, human trafficking, prostitution, lewdness, public indecency, vulgarity, weakening of public morality, obscenity, drug use . . . and the general erosion of communities” and her bill would “guard against” these impacts.
The bill received passing votes along party lines in the Senate, but it stalled in the House before the veto period. The House could still pass the bill, but it would be vulnerable to a Beshear veto.
This was Tichenor’s second attempt in as many years to regulate such businesses.
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Anti-vaccine bill
Another bill this session from Tichenor would have prohibited schools and workplaces from requiring COVID-19 vaccinations.
Under Senate Bill 295, no children or adults could be required to get a COVID-19 vaccine in order to attend school, get a job, acquire a professional license or receive any health care procedure.
Tichenor relied on misinformation — including a study in a scientific journal that was retracted for misrepresenting its data — about the safety and efficacy of the vaccine in order to support her claim that the bill was necessary.
In a floor debate, Tichenor wrongly claimed the “number of adverse events and deaths attributed to this vaccine are through the roof. We don’t have the count,” adding that “tens of thousands of people in the United States have died from this vaccine.”
There is no evidence to support this claim. In fact, studies have shown the rate of death is lower for people who were vaccinated than for those who weren’t vaccinated.
The Senate passed it without full Republican support, but it stalled in the House, where it has not received any of the three readings required before a floor vote.
CARR bill
CARR, an acronym for Crisis Aversion and Rights Retention orders, would have allowed for the temporary removal of guns from Kentuckians who may become violent or have mental illness.
It was carried by Sen. Whitney Westerfield, R-Fruit Hill, who served as Senate Judiciary Committee chairman. Westerfield filed the bill in the wake of the Old National Bank shooting in Louisville one year ago, and was supported by some in the law enforcement community, including a former Kentucky State Police commissioner.
Much was made of the bill in the lead-up to session, with a highly contentious committee meeting weeks before session began.
However, the bill never got any readings or a committee hearing in the Senate. The only co-sponsors on the bill were Democrats.
Abortion exceptions
For the second year since Kentucky enacted its near-total abortion ban, the Republican-controlled legislature did not pass a bill adding exceptions.
Currently, abortion is only legal if it’s needed to save the life of a pregnant person. A Republican and a Democrat filed bills this session to add exceptions in the event a pregnancy is cause by rape or incest, as well as fatal fetal anomalies that make a pregnancy nonviable.
Neither bill received a committee hearing.
As the Herald-Leader has previously reported, the lack of exceptions in Kentucky’s bans have forced pregnant women who need medically-recommended terminations to find care outside of the the state.
Baby Olivia Act
This bill would’ve required public schools to teach students as young as sixth grade about “human growth and development” that could’ve included a computer-generated video produced by an anti-abortion group.
Under House Bill 346, also known as the Baby Olivia Act from Rep. Nancy Tate, R-Brandenburg, each public school district, starting in middle school, would be required to screen a presentation of a “high-definition video, at least three minutes in duration, showing the development of the brain, heart, sex organs and other vital organs in early fetal development.”
The “Baby Olivia Act” — and the specific video parameters it called for — was a reference to the “Meet Baby Olivia” video from Live Action, an anti-abortion group that has referred to itself as the “digital leader of the global pro-life movement.”
In committee meetings, Tate said any video meeting the requirements could be shown to students and didn’t have to be “Meet Baby Olivia.”
Health care providers in Kentucky criticized the video for being “biased and scientifically inaccurate.”
Nearly identical bills were filed this session in other Republican-controlled states, including West Virginia and Tennessee. West Virginia never gave its bill final passage, but on April 4, Tennessee delivered its version of the bill to the governor’s desk for signing.
Tate’s bill was slated to be heard in the House for several days near the end of session, but was never called for a vote.
The other amendments ... for now
The General Assembly still has time to give final passage to proposed constitutional amendments, as bills placing those on the ballot for Kentuckians to approve or reject aren’t subject to veto.
However, most in Frankfort believe lawmakers will stick with two: the amendment allowing state funding to flow to nonpublic and charter schools and the amendment explicitly barring non-citizens from voting, despite that not currently being allowed anywhere in the state.
Other amendments made noise but did not make progress throughout session.
Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Ryland Heights, passed out of the Senate an amendment limiting the governor’s ability to pardon crimes near the end of their terms and another changing when gubernatorial elections are held; neither of those got any traction in the House.
House Speaker David Osborne, R-Louisville, made a splashy unveiling of an amendment changing how legislative sessions work. It never got a committee hearing.
Other bills
The Horizons Act, a major $300 million appropriations proposal from Sen. Danny Carroll, R-Benton, to help the state’s child care industry passed committee early in session. However, it never was called for a Senate floor vote.
A long-discussed bill that would have made water fluoridation optional for local water systems around the state made it the farthest it’s ever made it in the House. Despite 21 GOP sponsors, it floundered in the full House and was never called for a vote despite passing in committee. Kentucky dental organizations spoke out strongly against the bill, advocating for fluoridation as a key way to combat dental issues.
Two bills adding professional school programs to a pair of the state’s regional universities did not make it across the finish line. House Bill 400, which would have set up a doctoral degree program for veterinarians at Murray State University passed the House overwhelmingly. In the Senate, it never got a committee hearing. A bill adding an osteopathic medicine degree program to Eastern Kentucky University faced the same fate.
Making the state board of education a partisan election affair — currently members are appointed by the governor — was an idea that generated much discussion mid-session when a bill doing so passed out of the Senate with a handful of dissenting Republicans. In the House, the bill never received a committee hearing.
A bill making a drastic change to the way the Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife works, taking appointments away from the governor’s office and attaching it to the Department of Agriculture instead, passed the Senate but fell flat in the House. However, a bill similar to an amendment added onto the Fish & Wildlife bill moving the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission out from under the governor did cross the finish line.
House Bill 64, which would have exempted menstrual products from the state sales tax, did not see the light of day in the House despite its bipartisan sponsor list. A bill to exempt diapers from the sales tax, also with bipartisan support, met the same fate in the Senate.
