Employers in Montgomery County no longer will be able to inquire about current or prospective employees’ reproductive health history under a new bill passed unanimously by the County Council on Tuesday.
“It is critically important to provide protections to all of our residents of Montgomery County, but particularly those that are under attack based on federal policies that have been enacted recently over the last several years,” councilmember Gabe Albornoz (D-At-large), who co-sponsored the legislation with councilmember Dawn Luedtke (D-Dist. 7), said Tuesday. “This legislation is common sense and I believe will make a significant difference in our community.”
The bill “explicitly prohibit[s] employers from requesting or considering applicants’ sexual or reproductive health information, such as information related to abortion care, miscarriage, contraception, sterilization, pregnancy, or family planning,” according to the legislation.
If County Executive Marc Elrich (D) signs the bill into law, it will go into effect 120 days after. Elrich is currently on an economic development trip in Taiwan.
Local employers would still be permitted to ask questions about an employee or employee’s health history only to the extent that it is “business related” and relevant to the employee’s job duties, but sexual and reproductive history would be excluded.
The council passed a similar bill in March 2023, sponsored by Luedtke, that applied these restrictions to the county government as an employer.
“Those questions that were personally invasive, potentially harmful, and potentially detrimental to the county and in finding high-quality employees may be impacting our private-sector employees as well,” Luedtke said.
When working on the previous bill, Albornoz said he was “shocked” by “outdated and really inappropriate healthcare information” that was being asked of county employees and he wanted to extend the same protections to private sector employees, which inspired his sponsorship of the current legislation.
Luedtke said in December the legislation also was introduced partly in response to the Dobbs v. Jackson U.S. Supreme Court decision, which overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 and ruled that the U.S. Constitution does not confer the legal right to an abortion. Luedtke said while abortion is legal in Maryland, there is concern that private reproductive history could be passed along if an employee moves to a state where abortion is not legal.
In May 2023, Gov. Wes Moore (D) signed several abortion and reproductive health-related bills into law, including “shield laws.” These protect Maryland residents and patients who live outside of the state who receive reproductive health care and abortions within the state, as well as their physicians, from legal action and prosecution for receiving or providing that care.
Legislation sponsored by Silver Spring-based state Del. David Moon (D-Dist. 20) that would extend similar shielding protections to transgender people and physicians providing gender-affirming care has moved through its respective General Assembly committees and will be up for a final vote in the coming weeks.