Arise’s Carol Gundlach highlights a significant win from the 2025 legislative session: the enactment of paid parental leave for teachers and state employees, a top priority for Alabama Arise. This legislation represents a major advancement for parental and infant health.

Arise also continued to oppose harmful proposals last week, including junk health plans and bills that would impose barriers to Medicaid coverage and SNAP food assistance. Carol discusses how these state-level efforts are unfolding amid ongoing federal funding threats to these essential services.

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Hello, this is Carol Gundlach, senior policy analyst at Alabama Arise. Last week was a really hectic week at the Alabama Legislature, and we expect a similarly busy week this coming week.

The good news is that the paid parental leave bill, a top Alabama Arise priority, was passed by the Legislature last week and signed by the governor. This was a major victory for parental and newborn health, a model for other Southern states on workers’ rights. So we are very proud to have gotten this bill passed.

We also spent a lot of time last week speaking against some very bad bills at the Alabama Legislature. This included a junk insurance bill that was considered by the House Health Committee and two bills that would have placed administrative barriers on access to health care and food assistance for people receiving Medicaid and SNAP food stamp benefits.

This week, we’re expecting the education budget to be considered. That would include an expected major reform in how Alabama funds education for our most at-risk students. We are also, of course, working hard to make sure that schools that want to offer universal free breakfast for their students can afford to do so. And we are seeking funding to make this happen.

All of these efforts are, of course, happening in the context of federal concerns, particularly around funding and budgets for essential programs like Medicaid, food assistance, school meals and many more federal programs that are at risk for cuts, and that will make our work here in Alabama even harder.

Please check into our Alabama Arise website for both state and federal budget updates, and keep an eye on your emails for action updates. We need to work together now more than ever, so if you are not an Alabama Arise member, please join us. If you are an Alabama Arise member, please do everything you can to help advocate for essential programs at the state and federal level for our people and our members.

Thank you so much, and we’ll talk to you next week.