Message From Governor Lamont on Recent Supreme Court Rulings

Over the past week, the U.S. Supreme Court has issued rulings on matters that hit close to home for many in our state. Some of you may be feeling uneasy about one or more of the decisions, or even unsafe.

I have deep respect for our constitutional structure, and it is not my role to sit in judgment of the Court. But it is my duty to tell you where Connecticut stands, what we value, and what we are doing to protect the people of this state.

Immigrants Are Welcome Here

A common thread through several of these cases is the idea of our country closing the door it once held open. While I am heartened that five justices recognized that the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees birthright citizenship, its decision in Mullin v. Doe cleared the way for the administration to end Temporary Protected Status for hundreds of thousands of immigrants who fled danger and came here legally.

I met with members of the Haitian community in Norwich yesterday. They are afraid of losing their legal status and being forced back to a country overwhelmed by violence. To pull the rug out from under people who followed the rules is fundamentally unfair.

I told them what many have heard me say before: we see you, we support you, and you belong in Connecticut. Diversity is a strength, and our state is made richer by the immigrant communities who call it home.

And we are backing those words with action. Over the past year, as federal support was withdrawn, Connecticut stepped up by increasing support for health care, nutrition, and housing services that immigrant families rely on; helping sustain refugee resettlement agencies facing federal cuts; and enacting some of the strongest limits in the nation on state and local cooperation with ICE so that our law-abiding neighbors can live and work without fear. Attorney General Tong has gone to court repeatedly to defend them, including against the effort to end birthright citizenship.

We will continue to defend our immigrant communities with every tool we have.

We Protect Our Youth

The Court's decision allowing states to bar transgender girls from school sports stirs strong feelings on all sides. Let me start with the facts, then turn to our values.

Out of more than 530,000 NCAA student-athletes, the NCAA's president has testified that fewer than 10 are transgender. Comparable K-12 data does not exist, but every indication is that the numbers are similarly small.

Why does that matter? Because enormous political energy-up to and including a presidential administration-is being spent to stop a handful of children from playing sports with their friends. They argue about competitive advantages that the scientific record does not support, and dress their discrimination up as a defense of girls and women in sports.

If the true goal were the safety and dignity of women and girls, we would see it in the policies that actually shape their lives. We do not. States with abortion bans have roughly twice the maternal mortality rate of states that protect access to reproductive care. In the first year of its six-week ban, Texas saw maternal deaths rise by more than half and maternal sepsis climb sharply, as doctors delayed standard care out of fear of prosecution.

And the same movement now claiming to defend women's dignity has, again and again, blocked the Paycheck Fairness Act to guarantee equal pay and opposed strengthening the Violence Against Women Act to keep guns away from domestic abusers-the protections that actually save women's lives.

This misplaced energy troubles me not only as governor, but as a parent. The evidence on what this kind of targeting does to children is not in dispute. According to the Trevor Project, nearly 50% of transgender and nonbinary young people seriously considered suicide in the past year, and 90% of young LGBTQ+ people say anti-LGBTQ+ laws and the debates around them have caused them stress or anxiety. They are not at greater risk because of who they are, but because of how those in power choose to treat them.

Sports may be the pretext, but the purpose of these laws is to send a message to transgender people, and to their families, that they should not exist. I will not lend Connecticut's voice to that message.

Transgender people deserve dignity and safety, and transgender kids deserve to be included and loved. Connecticut will focus its power where it belongs-on the things that actually keep women and girls safe: access to reproductive care, prevention of domestic and sexual violence, and strong gun safety laws.

We Will Defend Our Democracy

Two quieter decisions this term are consequential for how our government functions and shapes your life.

The first I welcome: the Court upheld a state law counting mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day. Making it easier for eligible citizens to vote, not harder, is how a healthy democracy works. That's why I've reduced barriers to vote and encouraged participation in our democracy since taking office, including signing no-excuse absentee voting into law this past session.

That commitment also means resisting anti-democratic efforts. Historically, when requirements along the lines of the "SAVE Act" have been enacted, eligible voters-in particular, married women, older Americans, and rural voters-have been blocked from voting, not the noncitizens supposedly targeted. Connecticut will continue to guard against those barriers and keep the ballot within reach of every eligible voter.

The second troubles me. In Trump v. Slaughter, the Court gave the president sweeping authority over the independent bodies Congress built deliberately removed from day-to-day politics. For decades, federal agencies have made technical decisions on the strength of evidence and expertise, insulated from the pressure to please whoever currently holds power. Unfortunately, we have already seen what this administration does with that kind of control, such as when Secretary Kennedy reconstituted the federal vaccine advisory committee and rewrote the childhood immunization schedule. They did so not because the science changed, but because they preferred a different answer.

When people come to believe that a health recommendation or an enforcement action reflects only the politics of whoever is in charge, these institutions lose the authority that made them worth trusting. That trust is hard to rebuild, and it is reasonable to worry about the long-lasting impact this decision may have on our society.

Connecticut will defend the independence and expertise that serve our residents. This year we enacted our own vaccine standards law, so that no matter what happens in Washington, our immunization guidance stays grounded in science and proven vaccines remain available and affordable. We will keep our decisions rooted in evidence, and we will stand with the doctors, scientists, and public servants who tell people the truth.

We Will Combat Gun Violence

For Connecticut, no issue is closer to the heart than this one.

This term, the Court struck down a Hawaii law in Wolford v. Lopez, ruling that states may not stop concealed-carry permit holders from bringing firearms onto private property open to the public without the owner's permission. And in the days ahead, the Court has agreed to hear the challenge to our own assault weapons ban, alongside a similar law from the Chicago area, with arguments to come in the term beginning this October. These cases will be the first time the Court weighs the constitutionality of laws restricting the semiautomatic rifles used in so many of this nation's massacres.

Connecticut's assault weapons ban was not written in the abstract. It was enacted in 2013, in the aftermath of the unimaginable tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School, where a weapon designed for war took the lives of 20 first-graders and 6 educators.

That law is part of a broader, bipartisan gun safety framework that we have strengthened since 2019, including laws on background checks, a ban on ghost guns, our red flag law, and most recently a ban on convertible pistols. Our gun laws are part of why Connecticut remains among the safest states in the nation.

I intend to keep the promise made to grieving families over a decade ago. We will do everything in our power to keep weapons of war off our streets, out of our schools, and away from our neighborhoods. Connecticut will not back down from its right to protect its own people.