My local State Rep, Shaun Filiault (D-Keene), ran and won on the issue of repealing the gay panic defense. His first bill that he has sponsored as a State Rep is HB 315 "An act prohibiting provocations based on a victim’s actual or perceived gender, gender identity, gender expression, or sexual orientation from being used as a defense in a criminal case."
Last week it was voted on in the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee. While the bill made it through, a rather weird amendment was attached to it as part of the sausage-making process. The bill is now described as "An Act prohibition provocation based on the defendant's religion, race, creed, sexual orientation, national origin, political beliefs, or affiliation, sex, or gender identity."
That's right, this bill got All Lives Mattered.
This bill is of specific significance to the LGBTQ+ community because of an established history in this country of convicted killers of gay or trans people receiving a lighter sentence by arguing that they were so freaked out by someone's gender or sexuality, that they could not help but commit murder.
HB3 315, as originally written, was an affirmative refutation of this "gay panic defense" and, more broadly, the idea that gay people somehow deserve less protection under the law than everyone else.
This watered down version now I guess prohibits the "religious panic defense," the "racial panic defense," and the "creed panic defense," though none of those are actual defenses that have been used by lawyers and granted deference by courts. To be sure, hate crimes exist in all those categories, but its specifically the murders of gay and trans people that are currently open to legal question on grounds of "panic."
Broadening the law to include a number of at-risk groups - leading with religion - may seem like an egalitarian and way of finessing a delicate issue. But what it actually does is provide cover for those who want to turn away from recognizing that a specific injustice toward gay and trans people has existed in case law, and that it is appropriate for the State of New Hampshire to specifically repudiate that injustice.
The question of why people would want such cover is left as an exercise for the reader.
As Shaun said on the Facebook, "When an apple enters committee, it will exit a as pear.... Today I got a pear. A big old pear."