Virginia On Track to Establish Paid Family Medical Leave Program for Workers

Virginia lawmakers are a step closer to setting up paid family medical leave for up to 12 weeks — ensuring people are supported while they take time off to care for a family member, recover from surgery, or have a child. House and Senate proposals cleared their chambers this week and could head to Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s desk by the end of the legislative session.

Sen. Jennifer Boysko, D-Fairfax, speaks in the Senate of Virginia on Feb. 17, 2026. The chamber passed her paid family medical leave bill on Tuesday. (Photo by Shannon Heckt/Virginia Mercury)

Sen. Jennifer Boysko, D-Fairfax, who carried the Senate bill, said paid medical leave would have helped her family when she had a newborn in the neonatal intensive care unit and a 2-year-old at home 20 miles away from the hospital.

At the time, she’d delivered her daughter prematurely after a severe illness, and her husband’s company only granted two weeks of paid time off.

“I was still sick with no family around,” Boysko said of the stressful time juggling a toddler, her own physical recovery, and travel for her newborn. “It was an impossible situation, and we couldn’t afford for him (to take time off).”

Now that Boysko’s Senate Bill 2 and House Bill 1207 by Del. Briana Sewell, D-Prince William, have each passed their chambers, they will cross over to the opposite chamber. When bills pass in both chambers, they are workshopped to iron out any differences before they can then be signed, amended, or vetoed by the governor.

After previous versions were vetoed by former Gov. Glenn Youngkin, Spanberger is likely to sign what makes it to her desk this year.

In her State of the Commonwealth speech, Spanberger said that “being pro-business and being pro-worker are not mutually exclusive.  We can support business growth and invest in our workforce. We can attract new companies and protect workers. … That is why we will create a statewide paid family and medical leave program.”

Youngkin, on the other hand, framed it as a “one-size-fits-all government mandate” when explaining his veto.

Freedom Virginia director Rhena Hicks, who has advocated for the bill each year, pointed to how Spanberger has the experience of being a working mother to school-age children.

“It’s nice to have someone who I feel really gets the human experience of why this is so life-changing,” Hicks said in an interview on Tuesday.

The federal Family and Medical Leave Act requires employers with 50 or more workers to provide up to 12 weeks of leave, but does not require that employees be paid. Virginia’s version of the program would entail some state-funded setup, and then the program would be jointly funded, as most employers and employees pay into it.

If signed into law, the employees in companies with 10 or more staff members can tap into a partially-state-funded paid family leave program where they can receive up to 80% of their pay.

Republicans, however, have balked at the idea of the state funding paid family leave.

The startup costs are estimated to be $117.1 million over the 2027 and 2028 fiscal years, according to an analysis by the state’s Department of Planning and Budget.

There is also concern that companies might struggle to implement it.

“The impact will not fall evenly,” Del. Michael Webert, R-Faquier, said Tuesday ahead of the bill’s passage. “Large corporations may be able to absorb new premium costs and administrative burdens.”

He added that smaller businesses could struggle.

Hicks countered by saying the program would help smaller companies that would otherwise have to fund such a program entirely on their own. Hicks said the sentiment was shared by Hitchcock Paper Co. owner Sarah Burzio, when she hosted Boysko, Sewell, and advocates for an event about paid family medical leave last year.

Virginia’s proposal has also caught the eye of Reddit cofounder and University of Virginia alum Alexis Ohanian.

“I’ve seen firsthand how paid leave is good for business, and as a proud (University of Virginia) grad, I’m thrilled to see Virginia moving forward with a new law for 12 (weeks) paid family leave,” he wrote on social media this week with a link to a petition in support of the bill.

In the meantime, the 2026 legislative session still has a few weeks left to go, where the paid family medical leave proposals and hundreds of other bills will continue to be reviewed for a chance to get to the governor’s desk.

Calling it a “work in progress” before its passage Tuesday, Boysko emphasized that lawmakers can still “work diligently to make sure that we get it right.”

by Charlotte Rene Woods, Virginia Mercury

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