07.17.14

Durbin Applauds Administration Response To GOP Obstruction of Not My Boss's Business Act, Introduces Bill Requiring Employer Notification of Contraception Coverage For Current, Prospective Employees

Durbin: Women and families should be notified if employers deny health coverage

[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) today applauded the Administration’s announcement that the Department of Labor will require certain employers to notify current employees if they plan to eliminate coverage for contraception in their health insurance plans based on the Supreme Court’s recent Hobby Lobby decision.   Durbin also announced the introduction of legislation, the Preventive Care Coverage Notification Act, that will ensure that job applicants at for-profit corporations are informed in advance if the corporation intends to deny this coverage

 

“For-profit corporations shouldn’t put limits on their employees’ health insurance coverage based on their owners’ personal or religious beliefs—those health care decisions should be made by women and their families. While Senate Republicans turned their backs on millions of American women yesterday by blocking the Not My Boss’s Business Act, I applaud the Administration’s move to ensure that employees are at least notified of an employer’s plan to restrict its employees’ health coverage.

 

“I’m proud to introduce legislation today that will require for-profit corporations to notify both current and prospective employees of such policy changes, ensuring that women and their families have that additional information when making decisions about their own employment. Workers should be informed if their employers are restricting the availability of coverage for contraception or any other health care service guaranteed under law.”

 

The Preventive Care Coverage Notification Act calls on the Secretaries of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury to develop standards and requirements to ensure that employers notify current and prospective employees if the employer excludes coverage for health care services required under law, including contraceptive services.

 

Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked the Not My Boss’s Business Act, legislation that would prohibit employers from denying contraceptive coverage to their employees based on the employer’s personal or religious beliefs. Last month, the U.S. Supreme Court in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby upheld the Tenth Circuit’s expansion of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act to allow for-profit, secular corporations to deny their employees contraceptives to which the employees are entitled by federal law based on the religious objections of the corporations’ owners.