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Requires healthcare providers to notify a parent or guardian before delivering pregnancy-related services to a minor, with a judicial bypass process for cases where the minor objects.
OUR POSITIONThe family is the foundational institution of a well-ordered society, and parents bear a God-given responsibility to guide and protect their children. When a minor child faces one of the most consequential health decisions of her young life, her parents deserve to know. HB05309 restores that basic expectation by requiring providers to give notice to a parent or guardian before delivering pregnancy-related health care services to a minor. The American Council supports this bill without reservation.
Scripture is clear that children are a heritage entrusted to parents, and that parental authority over a child's upbringing is not a privilege granted by the state but a stewardship assigned by God. Connecticut law should reflect that reality. For too long, healthcare systems have treated parental involvement as an obstacle to be managed rather than a right to be honored. This bill corrects that posture by placing the law on the side of the family.
Pregnancy-related health care encompasses decisions with profound physical, emotional, and moral dimensions. A minor navigating those circumstances needs the wisdom, love, and support that parents are uniquely positioned to provide. Excluding parents from knowledge of these situations does not protect the minor; it isolates her at a moment when she most needs guidance from those who know and love her best.
The bill's judicial bypass provision is a recognized legal mechanism that accommodates rare and genuinely difficult circumstances. Its inclusion does not weaken the bill's core purpose. The default remains parental notice, and that default matters. A bypass process that requires a court to make an affirmative finding before notice is withheld is fundamentally different from a system that treats parental exclusion as routine.
The American Council urges Connecticut legislators to pass HB05309. Parental rights are not a political abstraction; they are the practical expression of a parent's duty to their child. This bill honors that duty and deserves the support of every legislator who believes the family, not the healthcare system, stands as the first and most important institution in a child's life.
HB05309 is currently in the Connecticut General Assembly's Joint Committee on Judiciary, having been referred there on February 24, 2026. A public hearing was scheduled for March 2, 2026, meaning the bill is in its earliest formal review stage where testimony is gathered and committee members assess whether to advance it. Connecticut's legislative session runs through early June, and bills that do not clear committee by the chamber's deadlines typically expire without further action. Constituent contact is most impactful right now, before and immediately after the March 2 public hearing, when committee members are actively weighing input before any vote on whether to advance the bill.