Reproductive rights defenders decried the signing of a near-total abortion ban in Florida in a single day by Republican Governor Ron DeSantis, a probable presidential candidate for the GOP in 2024.
Republican state lawmakers, which management each legislative chambers within the state, despatched S.B. 300 to DeSantis’ desk with a purpose to bar the medical process after simply six weeks of being pregnant, earlier than most individuals know they’re pregnant. Losing no time, the governor signed the invoice simply earlier than midnight.
The invoice handed within the Florida Home of Representatives by a 70-40 vote on Thursday afternoon, largely alongside get together traces, after approval by the GOP-controlled Senate earlier this month. Whereas the legislation won’t go into impact instantly, the laws is designed to exchange an present 2022 Florida legislation prohibiting abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy with a six-week ban containing exceptions for victims of rape, incest, or human trafficking; in circumstances of deadly fetal abnormalities; or to avoid wasting the pregnant particular person’s life.
Jezebel reports Republican state lawmakers rejected an modification to incorporate an exception for a life-threatening situation that not too long ago caused a woman to miscarry in a hair salon and practically bleed to loss of life. The lady, Anya Prepare dinner, is Black; this week is Black Maternal Well being Week.
DeSantis, an ally of former President Donald Trump broadly anticipated to hunt the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, promised he would signal the six-week ban into legislation.
“I’ve mentioned…we’re for pro-life,” the governor mentioned final month. “I urged the legislature to work, produce good things, and we are going to signal.”
S.B. 300 is written so that it’ll grow to be legislation if the Florida Supreme Court docket affirms the 15-week ban. The court docket is predicted to listen to a case involving that ban within the coming months.
Responding to Thursday’s vote within the state Home, Florida Senate Minority Chief Lauren Guide (D-32) tweeted that “Florida Republicans have now handed a harmful abortion ban by each the Home and the Senate — selecting to ignore the pleas of girls and the medical doctors entrusted with their care, together with two moms in my very own district pressured to the brink of loss of life following miscarriages because of the state’s present restrictive legal guidelines.”
“Now, issues will get a lot worse,” she added. “Ladies have been stripped of their rights and entry to lifesaving healthcare. Ladies will undoubtedly die. This isn’t freedom.”
Florida state Rep. Anna Eskamani (D-47) took to the legislature ground in pre-vote debate Thursday to suggest an modification to rename S.B. 300, formally the Being pregnant and Parenting Assist Act.
“Members,” she mentioned, “this modification renames the invoice to the Compelled Being pregnant Act, which is principally what it does.”
Abortion rights defenders — a few of whom have been joined by Democratic Florida lawmakers in an impromptu singing of “Lean on Me” within the State Capitol after Thursday’s vote — additionally warned that the six-week ban poses life-and-death dangers to Floridians.
“Throughout the nation, pregnant individuals are being pushed to the brink of loss of life as a result of they’ll’t get an abortion. But Florida lawmakers have rushed this harmful ban by the legislature with no concern for his or her residents and the way it will hurt them,” Elisabeth Smith, director of state coverage and advocacy on the Middle for Reproductive Rights, mentioned in a statement.
“This invoice threatens to finish abortion nearly totally amid a rising public well being disaster,” she continued. “If this ban takes impact, Floridians can be stranded in an unlimited abortion desert and compelled to journey over 1,000 miles to get an abortion. Nobody ought to need to face that, and many individuals will be unable to make that journey.”
Frequent Goals previously reported the ordeal of Nancy Davis, a Louisiana lady pressured to hold a fetus with a deadly cranium deformity inside her physique for six months after which make a 2,500-mile spherical journey to New York with a purpose to receive an abortion.
“We additionally should bear in mind,” Smith added, “that Mifepristone is under attack, and if that tablet is taken off the market, it would grow to be even tougher to get an abortion earlier than six weeks.”
Though a panel of the right-wing fifth U.S. Circuit Court docket of Enchantment on Thursday quickly blocked a Texas federal decide’s invalidation of the federal government’s approval of mifepristone — certainly one of two medication usually taken in tandem to induce medical abortion — reproductive rights campaigners warned that the ruling nonetheless poses a grave risk.
Earlier this week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) contended that if the U.S. Supreme Court docket hears the Texas case and the court docket’s right-wing supermajority upholds the ruling, “it might primarily institute a nationwide abortion ban.”
Kara Gross, the ACLU of Florida’s legislative director and senior coverage counsel, mentioned that “in a state that prides itself on being free, that is an unprecedented and unacceptable stage of presidency overreach and intrusion.”
“This near-total abortion ban will successfully eradicate authorized abortion care in Florida,” Gross continued. “It can power lots of of hundreds of pregnant folks to need to journey out of state to hunt the care they want. Others will probably be pressured to stay pregnant towards their will and endure labor and supply and the entire important medical dangers related to being pregnant and delivery. “
“Floridians deserve higher from their elected leaders who’re answerable for representing their voices and defending their freedoms,” she asserted. “The federal government ought to by no means be capable to power anybody to hold a being pregnant towards their will. Each Floridian deserves entry to well being care and the precise to make private choices about their very own lives, households, and futures.”
NARAL Professional-Alternative America president Mini Timmaraju mentioned in a statement that “this ban is harmful, plain and easy. It won’t solely reduce off abortion entry for Floridians however the numerous individuals who have sought care there as extremists in their very own states implement bans.”
“Ron DeSantis talks in regards to the ‘Free State of Florida,’ however it’s clear that if he indicators this invoice as he has signaled he’ll, he’ll be promoting out our freedoms for his personal private ambition, stooping to new lows to win the 2024 GOP main,” Timmaraju added. “He ought to have listened in November when voters made it clear they don’t assist abortion bans — he can rely on listening to it once more when he’s on the poll subsequent.”
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