Legislative Agenda for 2021-2022
Policy Priority
The Reproductive Health Rights Act (S. 1348)
The Reproductive Health Rights Act (S. 1348) is a bold commitment to improving the health and lives of South Carolinians. The bill would repeal existing restrictions on abortion care and affirm the rights to contraception, in vitro fertilization, sex education, and all other forms of reproductive health care. Full access to reproductive health care is essential for the health, education, economic security, and equality of all South Carolinians.
Policy Priority
Act to Establish Pay Equity (H. 3183 and S.514)
These sister bills would make pay discrimination on the basis of race, religion, sex, gender identity, age, national origin or disability illegal in South Carolina.
Policy Priority
Pharmacy Access Act (S.628)
This bill would authorize pharmacists to prescribe contraceptives, which can make contraceptive care more accessible and affordable by eliminating the need for a separate visit to a health care provider to obtain a prescription. Expanding pharmacists’ scope of practice to include prescribing birth control helps alleviate many of the obstacles to finding and seeing a doctor that have been exacerbated by the pandemic.
Policy Priority
PASSED! Paid Family Leave for State Employees (H. 3560 and S.11)
This bill would provide state employees up to 6 weeks of paid family leave for the birth or adoption of a child, or up to 2 weeks for placement of a foster child. Paid family leave is crucial to supporting working families’ economic security and promoting gender equity in workplaces. No one should have to risk their job or face financial loss when they need to welcome a new child.
Policy Priority
Paid Family Leave for State Employees (H. 3560 and S.11)
This bill would provide state employees up to 6 weeks of paid family leave for the birth or adoption of a child, or up to 2 weeks for placement of a foster child. Paid family leave is crucial to supporting working families’ economic security and promoting gender equity in workplaces. No one should have to risk their job or face financial loss when they need to welcome a new child.
Partner Bill
PASSED-End School Lunch Debt Collection (H. 3006)
H. 3006 would ban the use of debt collectors to collect debts for school lunch or breakfast accounts and prevent entities from assessing or collecting any interest, fees, or additional charges for outstanding debts.
Partner Bill
End Child Marriage in SC
S.591 would make the minimum of marriage in South Carolina 18 years old.
Partner Bill
Increasing Voter Access (H.3822)
H. 3822 is a comprehensive bill that would bring to South Carolina absentee voting provisions that have been successful in other states through many election cycles.
Partner Bill
End Lunch Shaming Bill (H.3319)
This bill would provide equity in school lunches and protect students from punitive measures if they have accrued meal debt.
Partner Bill
Community Development Tax Credit (Signed Into Law)
Article 25, Section 12-6-3530 was amended and signed into law on May 18, 2021. An additional $1 million in Community Development (CD) Tax Credits were allocated for 2021, and $2 million for tax years beginning after 2021.
Partner Bill
Menstrual Equity (H.3747 & S.574)
The Menstrual Equity bills, H.3747 and S.574, would exempt menstrual hygiene products from sales tax. The removal of the tax on period products would alleviate the additional monthly expense of paying a luxury tax on a necessary medical product.
Partner Bill
PASSED! Prohibit Paying Sub-Minimum Wages to People With Disabilities (S.533)
S.533 would assemble a taskforce to create a three-year transition plan to phase out subminimum wage by August 1, 2024. Currently, the United States still operates under a law in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which grants certain employers a 14(c) certificate to pay people with disabilities less than the minimum wage—sometimes pennies an hour. In South Carolina as of 2020, approximately 1,200 people with disabilities are making less than the minimum wage. Several states have already restricted the use of subminimum wage, and South Carolina looks to be the next state to eliminate this.
Partner Bill
Confidentiality Bill (S.340 & H.4009)
This bi-partisan bill provides that non-profit sexual assault and domestic violence provider organizations are not required to disclose certain confidences acquired by clients during the provision of services to those clients. Certain exceptions are necessarily provided.
Partner Bill
Paid Sick Leave Act (H.3469)
This bill would provide earned paid sick leave to employees statewide.
Partner Bill
Dignity in Pregnancy and Childbirth Act (H.3225)
H.3225 would create an intentional study committee dedicated to addressing the disparities in Black maternal health that has buy-in from the legislative leaders in our state.
Partner Bill
South Carolina Equal Pay for Equal Work Act (H.3188)
This bill prohibits on the basis of sex paying wages to employees of one sex at a lesser rate than the rate paid to employees of the opposite sex for comparable work in jobs which require the same, or essentially the same, knowledge, skill, effort, and responsibility.
In Opposition
Abortion Ban (Trigger Ban with Personhood Language) S.988 and S.1127
These bills use language referring to a fertilized egg as a person, meaning that a fertilized egg has all the same rights and protections as a living, breathing human. They are both trigger bans, meaning they will only go into effect if Roe V. Wade is overturned or significantly modified.
In Opposition
Medication Abortion Misinformation (S.907 and H.4568)
This bill would force providers to disclose medically inaccurate information about medication abortion. It would require doctors to tell abortion patients who receive a medication abortion that they can reverse the medication they’ve taken.
In Opposition
Healthcare Discrimination Bills (S.811, S.1130, and H.4776)
These bills would allow health care professionals to discriminate against their patients and refuse to provide them care. This dangerous and far-reaching bill permits any person participating in health care service to deny care to their patients for any reason, without a medical justification.
In Opposition
Voting Restrictions (H.4150)
H.4150 provides for but restricts in-person no-excuse early voting as well as greatly reduces the existing excused-absentee voting criteria for mail-in or hand delivery. This would lead to poor access for some voters.
In Opposition
SC Minor Child Compassion and Protection Act (H.4047)
This bill would prohibit transgender people under the age of 18 from receiving essential medical care and create a school climate where they are unable to be themselves. The bill would make it a felony for medical professionals to provide transition-related care to transgender minors. Conviction could result in up to a 20-year prison sentence for the medical provider. The bill also requires teachers and staff at schools in South Carolina to share with students’ parents if they learn that a student’s “perception of [their] gender or sex is inconsistent with the minor's sex.” In effect, the bill essentially requires teachers to “out” transgender students to their parents, potentially before they are ready to share. A nearly identical bill is pending in Alabama.
In Opposition
Bills Targeting Transgender Athletes (H.4608,H.4153, S.531, and H.3477)
Governor Henry McMaster signed H.4608, an anti-transgender bill that restricts transgender students from participating in school sports in middle school, high school, and college.
In Opposition
Special Exemptions For Melting Plastics Industry (H.3753 and S.525)
WREN is committed to ensuring that all communities live in safe, healthy environments with the resources necessary to thrive because health does not begin and end at care and coverage. Good health and the decision of when or how to parent are intrinsically tied to other conditions, including access to safe drinking water, adequate housing, education, safe working conditions, and living free from violence. H.3753 and S.525 puts health and safety of communities at risk by removing the State’s authority to regulate pollution caused by plastic trash facilities.
In Opposition
6-Week Abortion Ban (S.1)
S.1 was passed by the South Carolina Legislature and signed into law by Governor McMaster on February 18th, 2021. A lawsuit was immediately filed against it and as a result, a federal judge issued an order blocking S.1 from taking effect. S.1 is not currently enforceable in South Carolina, abortion is still legal, and patients can still access abortion services in our state. S.1 was intended to ban abortion as early as 6 weeks, regardless of a pregnant person’s needs and circumstances. S.1 poses a serious threat to the health, freedom, and dignity of pregnant people. This was a far-reaching bill drafted by extremist politicians whose goal is to eliminate all abortion in South Carolina.