Michigan committee hears testimony on five-bill 'fertility fraud' package amid split over scope and penalties

LANSING — The House Families and Veterans Committee heard hours of testimony on HB 5035 through HB 5039, a five-bill package sponsored by Representatives Joseph Roth and Alicia Saint Germain that would create criminal penalties for intentional misrepresentation connected to assisted reproduction services.

Sponsors and victims described cases in which donors or clinic personnel misrepresented identity or, in some allegations, a practitioner used his own genetic material. "Doctor that ran the clinic actually used his own DNA to inseminate mom," Rep. Roth told the panel as he urged lawmakers to add legal guardrails for patients. Victims who testified by Zoom described personal consequences: "I was born in fraud," said Jamie Hall, who told the committee she learned through consumer DNA testing that her biological father was the physician at the clinic her parents used.

Rep. Alicia Saint Germain, who described HB 5038 as the "hammer" bill, told the committee the package would increase criminal penalties for people who "provide false representation of reproductive procedures," including penalties…