1). “US court’s abortion pill ruling: Another milestone in the assault on democratic rights”, April 10, 2023, Patrick Martin, World Socialist Web Site (WSWS), at < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/04/11/pers-a11.html >
2). “Florida Lawmakers Pass Six-Week Abortion Ban, One of Strictest in U.S.”, April 14, 2023, Patricia Mazzei, David W. Chen and Alexandra Glorioso, 1,926 words, The New York Times.
3). “DeSantis quietly signs 6-week abortion ban law without ceremony after contentious state house debate”, Apr 14, 2023, Kimberly Leonard, Business Insider, at <https://www.businessinsider.com/dem-copies-disneys-power-move-in-attempt-to-stop-florida-abortion-ban-2023-4>.
4). “Ron DeSantis knows his 6-week abortion ban could come back to haunt him — that's why he's doing it under the radar”, Apr 14, 2023, Madison Hall, Business Insider, at <https://www.businessinsider.com/ron-desantis-knows-his-new-abortion-ban-could-haunt-him-2023-4>
5). “DeSantis could be walking into a general election trap on abortion: Democrats prepared to pounce after Florida governor backed a six-week abortion ban”, April 13, 2023, Sally Goldenberg & Alice Miranda Ollstein, Politico, at <https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/13/democrats-tie-anti-abortion-bill-around-desantis-swing-states-00091976?nname=florida-playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b4500000&nrid=b4685157-ada3-409f-bcdf-bbe5503e64c6&nlid=630310>.
Introduction by dmorista: Item 1)., “US court’s abortion pill ruling: Another milestone in the assault on democratic rights”, specifically discusses the Mifepristone ruling by the reactionary Federal District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk. It does a good job of looking at what other public policy issues might be affected by his ruling if it is allowed to stand. It also provides some good analysis of the reasons why the Liberals and Biden have proven to be such poor advocates for the people most seriously affected by the ongoing assault on Abortion and Reproductive Health care. The other 4 articles all address the 6-week abortion ban in Florida and the effect this will have on Ron DeSantis, who signed the bill in a quiet late evening signing ceremony.
The Far-Right, an important component of the minions of the U.S. Ruling Class, continues its campaign to end all access to Reproductive Health Care in the U.S. The biggest development, since the two court rulings on Mifepristone, has been the passage of a 6-week abortion ban in Florida. Item 2)., “Florida Lawmakers Pass Six-Week Abortion Ban, One of Strictest in U.S.”, discusses the overall process in the Florida Legislature in addition to the role that DeSantis played. Item 3)., “DeSantis quietly signs 6-week abortion ban law without ceremony after contentious state house debate”, focuses more on the role that DeSantis played (with his 11:00 PM very quiet signing) and how he took measures to try to protect his potential Presidential campaign in 2024. Ron DeSantis came back to Florida, after delivering a standard fascist harangue at Liberty University (that was founded by Jerry Falwell Sr, and later fleeced by Jerry Falwell Jr.). As Item 4)., “Ron DeSantis knows his 6-week abortion ban could come back to haunt him — that's why he's doing it under the radar”, points out: “When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis enacted a 15-week abortion ban for people who are pregnant in April 2022, it was to much fanfare, with the governor surrounded by supporters and television crews.” And the ceremony took place at a reactionary Hispanic Church. (Emphasis added).
The last article Item 5)., “DeSantis could be walking into a general election trap on abortion: ….”, looks specifically at moves already afoot and others that various observers think the Democrats will use against Ron Desantis. While the Democrats are not much better than the Republicans, they are somewhat better and an election strategy that defeats Ron DeSantis in a general election for President would be a fine development.
(Photo of a beaming and gloating DeSantis as he signed the 15-week Abortion Ban in April of 2022. Here with the lights on him from the TV Camera Crews)
In contrast to the hoopla and publicity at the 15-week Bill Signing; DeSantis sneaked back into Florida and signed the 6-week abortion ban a bit after 1100 PM in front of a small group of true-believers. Like many on the Republican far-right DeSantis did not anticipate the ongoing and long-term animosity, that overturning Roe v. Wade and the subsequent endless stream of Forced-Birth Legislation afterwards, was generating.
Of course, the medium-term and long-term response of the American Far-Right and the Rich Ruling Class elements they work for, is to completely subvert the election process: so they can declare themselves the winners regardless of the actual votes in elections (something they already do to a large extent).
The ongoing negative changes in access to Abortion are shown in the map below. We can certainly expect that there is no chance that the States of Ohio, Indiana, and Florida will be legislating free access to abortion any time soon. If anything the map is too optimistic. South Carolina, for example, has had serious proposed legislation that would enact the death penalty against women who obtain abortions. In Iowa, the State Attorney General, has just ended a policy of supplying rape victims with emergency after-the-fact contraception, and has specifically denied them the ability to obtain it themselves. In a positive development, the election of the Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice, Janet Protasiewicz, bodes well for an overturning of the draconian anti-abortion law that has been on the books there since 1849.
1). “US court’s abortion pill ruling: Another milestone in the assault on democratic rights”, April 10, 2023, Patrick Martin, World Socialist Web Site (WSWS), at < https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/04/11/pers-a11.html >
(Caption: The J. Marvin Jones Federal Building and Mary Lou Robinson United States Courthouse in Amarillo, Texas. This is the courthouse where U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk recently imposed a ban on the abortion drug mifepristone. [AP Photo/Justin Rex] )
The ruling issued Friday by federal District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, overturning approval of the abortion pill mifepristone by the Food and Drug Administration, is the most flagrant attack on the democratic right to abortion since the Supreme Court’s decision last summer to overturn Roe v. Wade.
The decision, if not reversed on an emergency appeal, will have a catastrophic effect on health care for poor and working class women. Five million have used the two-drug combination of mifepristone and misoprostol in the two decades since the procedure was approved. In recent years, these medications have surpassed surgery as the most common abortion procedure, with an estimated 500,000 women making use of mifepristone in 2022.
In embracing the Comstock Act, a barbaric 1873 law that criminalized any delivery of materials relating in any way to sex or abortion through the mail or by commercial carrier, Kacsmaryk opened the door to legal challenges to any form of abortion, not just the pill, as well as contraception.
The decision would have a profoundly disruptive effect on the entire pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries, according to an open letter issued Monday, signed by 400 CEOs and other executives. They noted that substituting the judgment of untrained judges for the scientific expertise of the FDA would open a Pandora’s box for legal challenges to vaccines and other lifesaving treatments.
Under the principles laid down by the judge, anti-vax groups would be able to seek injunctions against the distribution of the vaccines that have saved countless lives in the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as vaccines for childhood illnesses that have been falsely linked to autism.
Kacsmaryk is an anti-abortion fanatic appointed to the federal bench by Donald Trump after five years as the deputy general counsel for a Christian fundamentalist group. He simply translated his conservative Catholic religious views into law, in gross violation of the separation of church and state laid down in the First Amendment to the US Constitution.
He trampled over such legal principles as the requirement that plaintiffs should have standing to sue: an actual injury suffered, not simply an ideological objection to a particular decision or law. He dismissed the evident fact that 23 years after the FDA’s decision to approve mifepristone as safe and effective, the statute of limitations (six years) had long expired.
The method by which the case was brought before Kacsmaryk demonstrates that the ruling is the product of a political conspiracy against democratic rights. Right-wing groups have adopted a judge-shopping technique in which cases are filed in small judicial divisions in Texas with only a single judge, ensuring that they get the judge they want, one who is certain to rule in their favor.
A host of reactionary decisions have been engineered in this way, attacking the rights of immigrants, banning free medical care for gay men and other targets of fundamentalist bigotry and overturning other administrative actions by the Biden administration.
The response of the White House has been to comply with these judicial outrages, rather than challenging them and exposing the process as illegitimate. Biden and the Democratic Party have no concern over the hundreds of thousands of working class women who will be denied the simplest and least risky procedure for accessing abortion, and who may soon be denied any access at all.
The privileged upper-middle-class layer that constitutes the social basis of the Democratic Party, along with Wall Street and the Pentagon, will be able to access abortion services, through private resources or travel to another country if necessary, regardless of the legal counterrevolution being pursued by the ultra-right in the United States.
It is notable that despite the obsession of this layer with identity politics, based on race, gender and sexual orientation, there has been little response on their part to the repeal of Roe v. Wade or to the latest judicial atrocity.
Biden’s preoccupation has been to insist on the need for a “strong” Republican Party, as he has said many times since the attempted coup on January 6, 2021, showed the fundamentally authoritarian and anti-democratic course on which Trump and his supporters, and the Republican Party as a whole, have embarked.
The essence of this “strong Republican Party” is now made clear, as a Trump-appointed judge issues a rabid anti-democratic ruling, which the Justice Department will appeal to the Fifth Circuit Court, where six out of 18 judges were appointed by Trump, and then to the Supreme Court, with six Republicans out of nine justices, including three appointed by Trump.
The character of the Supreme Court majority has been demonstrated in the revelation last week that Justice Clarence Thomas, the most consistently reactionary of the nine, regularly went on lavish vacations in the company of Texas billionaire Harlan Crow, who paid for everything, and Thomas never reported these lucrative favors to the court or the public.
The Supreme Court justice dismissed criticism of what he called “family trips” involving “personal hospitality” by some of his “dearest friends.” On Monday, Rolling Stone magazine reported that Crow had a large collection of Nazi memorabilia, including several paintings by Hitler, a copy of Mein Kampf signed by the author himself, linen embossed with the swastika and medallions of the fascist party. Did one of his “dearest friends” display his Nazi hoard to Justice Thomas?
Neither the Biden administration nor the Democratic Party will lift a finger against this right-wing cabal. Their sole political concern is to keep the Republican Party on board with the US proxy war against Russia in Ukraine. Insofar as the Democrats claim to defend abortion rights, it is only to provide a “left” cover for an administration and a party that have abandoned any shred of social reform and are funneling hundreds of billions—at the expense of the working class—into the current war against Russia and preparations for a future war with China.
There is an even more fundamental reason for Biden’s determination to maintain a strong Republican Party, even one that is engaged in a fascistic rampage against democratic rights. Biden seeks to boost the Republican Party in order to avoid a collapse of the capitalist two-party system which could create an opening for the emergence of the working class as an independent political force.
The potential for such a political eruption is evident, in the initial wave of strikes in 2021 and 2022, in industry, health care and education and the struggles of workers in rail, the docks and other critical sectors of the economy. When class questions are on the line, as in the struggle by 110,000 rail workers against brutal exploitation and cuts in real wages, Biden drops the mask of “friend of labor” and makes it clear that he is really the friend of the union apparatus, which he relies on to suppress the working class. When that apparatus needs reinforcement, Biden is there to supply it, signing the bill last December to ban a rail strike and impose a contract already rejected by the workers.
Young people and working people who seek to defend abortion rights must turn to this growing movement of the working class. Abortion rights, like all democratic rights, are a class question. The defense of the rights of working class women must be fought for by the working class as a whole, as an integral part of its class struggle against the corporations and the capitalist state.
2). “Florida Lawmakers Pass Six-Week Abortion Ban, One of Strictest in U.S.”, Apr. 14, 2023, Patricia Mazzei, David W. Chen and Alexandra Glorioso, 1,926 words, The New York Times.
The prohibition is among the most restrictive in the country, and Florida will no longer be a destination for women from across the Deep South seeking the procedure.
MIAMI -- Florida lawmakers voted to prohibit abortions after six weeks of pregnancy on Thursday, culminating a rapid effort by elected Republicans and Gov. Ron DeSantis to transform the state to one of the most restrictive in the country.
Mr. DeSantis, a likely 2024 Republican presidential contender, said on Twitter Thursday night that he had signed the new ban, which will end Florida's long-held role as a destination for women from across the Deep South seeking abortions and force them to travel farther, to states such as North Carolina or Illinois, for care.
In the six months after the Supreme Court overturned the federal right to abortion last year, no state saw a greater increase in the number of legal abortions performed each month than Florida, according to a report released on Tuesday.
''For the past 50 years, we've had a culture grow in this nation -- a culture of abortion for any reason at any time,'' State Representative Jenna Persons-Mulicka, a Fort Myers Republican, said before the 70-40 vote. ''Today we lead. Today we stand for life. We stand with mothers, and we stand with Florida families. And by your vote today, we change the culture of abortion to a culture of life.''
Seven Republicans, mostly from Southeast Florida and the Tampa area, broke with their party and voted against the ban. Nine representatives did not vote.
Mr. DeSantis signed the six-week ban despite the complicated politics the issue presents. The new restriction would help him, to an extent, with conservative Republicans in a presidential primary but would likely be far less appealing to many moderate Republicans and independent voters in a general election.
Prohibiting abortion at that stage in pregnancy would have not long ago seemed unthinkable in Florida, which until recently was a swing state governed from near the political center, rather than the far right.
The new ban is among several sweeping and divisive measures adopted over the past month by the Florida Legislature, which was empowered by Mr. DeSantis's landslide re-election victory. The governor has signed laws allowing people to carry concealed weapons without a permit and broadly expanding school vouchers. State senators passed a bill banning medication and surgery for children seeking gender transitions and another prohibiting children from attending certain drag shows.
Approval of the six-week abortion ban by the Florida House of Representatives was a foregone conclusion on Thursday. Still, over more than seven hours of discussion, Democrats offered dozens of amendments, none of which were adopted. Protesters interrupted the tense discussion, prompting Republican leaders to clear the viewing gallery. The demonstrators briefly gathered outside the chamber, chanting, ''Hands off our bodies!''
As recently as a year ago, Florida allowed abortions until 24 weeks of pregnancy. Then, last spring, Mr. DeSantis and state lawmakers limited access to the procedure after 15 weeks, a major change that took effect in July and is still being legally challenged. The new six-week ban is contingent, in part, on whether the Florida Supreme Court upholds the 15-week restriction.
In the past, the court has ruled that the explicit right to privacy guaranteed by the State Constitution protects abortion rights. But that was before Mr. DeSantis appointed several more conservative justices, who have shifted the court's ideological balance.
Most of the 13 states that prohibit almost all abortions are in the South, including Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana. Florida would now join Georgia at the next-most-restrictive level with the six-week ban, around the time when fetal cardiac activity can be detected. At that gestation stage, many women do not yet realize that they are pregnant.
At the same time, dueling court rulings and legal challenges over the use of an abortion drug have made the future of medication abortions unclear.
Mr. DeSantis's signature on the Florida ban would keep the Republican Party pressing deeper into abortion restrictions, even as some of the party's activists are pleading with politicians to step back. Senator Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican who announced a presidential exploratory committee on Wednesday, said he would back a nationwide ban on abortions at 20 weeks -- a position framed as a moderate middle ground but one that Democrats nonetheless seized on to frame the recent anti-abortion drive as a threat to Democratic states.
David Winston, a veteran pollster for the House Republican leadership, worried that Republican politicians, pressed by conservative activists, were moving much faster than most voters want.
''People are trying to take next steps without taking a step back and asking, How do we get to decisions that would seem to voters to be a reasonable next step?'' he said.
But Katie Glenn Daniel, state policy director for the anti-abortion group Susan B. Anthony Pro Life America, said such concerns were overblown, noting Republicans' electoral victories in Florida last year after the 15-week ban was adopted.
''What we see is that when candidates stake out a position, are clear about that position and don't let their opponents define them because they've taken the ostrich position, burying their heads in the sand and hoping they go away, they do well,'' she said.
While legal abortions in the United States fell by 6 percent in the six months after the decision overturning Roe v. Wade -- Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization -- Florida recorded the largest numerical increase of any state: 1,200 a month. The share of all U.S. abortions performed there, moreover, increased to 9.5 percent, from 7.5 percent, trailing only California and New York, according to a report from WeCount, a research project from the Society of Family Planning, which supports abortion rights.
In Tallahassee, the Planned Parenthood health center has seen a doubling of abortion patients since the Dobbs decision. In all, the number of out-of-state patients seeking abortions has quadrupled at nine Planned Parenthood health centers along the state's northern border and east coast.
Should a six-week abortion ban become law, access would be far more difficult.
According to data compiled by Caitlin Myers, an economist at Middlebury College, the average driving distance to the closest abortion provider in Florida is 22 miles, or about half an hour. A six-week ban would make it 607 miles, or more than nine hours.
There were 54 abortion providers in Florida at the end of 2022, according to data from Advancing New Standards in Reproductive Health at the University of California, San Francisco. There are only a handful of providers, by contrast, in the two other states in the Southeast where abortion remains more accessible, for now -- South Carolina and North Carolina.
Since the United States Supreme Court overturned Roe last summer, Democrats have won elections that centered on abortion rights in other states, including this month in Wisconsin, where voters chose a liberal candidate for the State Supreme Court who all but promised that she would help reverse an 1849 abortion ban.
But in Florida, Republicans won handily last November, even after Democratic candidates pressed the abortion issue.
Mr. DeSantis, however, rarely brought up abortion during his re-election campaign and has continued to emphasize other issues, a tacit acknowledgment that, as past public opinion polls have shown, a majority of Floridians -- and of Americans -- want to keep most abortions legal.
Florida's 15-week abortion ban became law last year before the overturning of Roe v. Wade. That decision led abortion opponents to step up pressure on the state to go even further in restricting the procedure. Republicans, who hold supermajorities in both legislative chambers, introduced the six-week prohibition in March, on the first day of the annual lawmaking session.
In Thursday's debate, Democrats argued that the ban would force women to seek care in other states or to see their pregnancies through. That would have a profound effect on marginalized and vulnerable communities, they said.
Democrats also recounted the stories of Florida women who have publicly discussed over the past year how they have had to carry nonviable pregnancies because doctors would not terminate them. State Representative Robin Bartleman, a Weston Democrat who last year said she agonized over whether to end a pregnancy with a fatal fetal abnormality, tearfully shared her experience again.
''Do you know how painful that was?'' she said. ''Do you know how terrible that was? No one here belonged in that room with me.''
Republicans argued that they were saving lives.
''I favor an outright ban on abortion,'' said State Representative Mike Beltran, a Riverview Republican. ''This is a compromise. For every person who thinks this goes too far, there are folks who feel that it doesn't go far enough.''
The State Senate approved the ban this month with a vote of 26-13. Two freshman Republicans, Senators Alexis Calatayud of Miami and Corey Simon of Tallahassee, joined Democrats in voting no.
''I gave them my word that I would support Florida's current law of 15 weeks,'' Ms. Calatayud said of her constituents. Mr. Simon expressed a similar sentiment.
Later that day, the police in Tallahassee arrested 11 people who were protesting the legislation outside City Hall, which is across the street from the Florida Capitol, including the chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party and the Senate minority leader.
The six-week ban would take effect 30 days after the Florida Supreme Court either upholds the 15-week ban from last year, reinterprets the privacy clause in the State Constitution or revisits prior cases to decide that the clause does not apply to abortion rights. Alternatively, if Florida were to amend the State Constitution to say the privacy clause does not apply to abortion rights, the six-week restriction would also take effect 30 days later.
The six-week ban would provide exceptions for abortions to take place until 15 weeks for pregnancies that resulted from rape, incest or human trafficking, as long as the woman provides documentation such as a restraining order, medical record or police report. The 15-week ban passed last year included exceptions only for a fatal fetal abnormality or to save the life of the woman.
The new law would also prohibit doctors from prescribing medication abortions through telehealth, making Florida's six-week ban even more restrictive than Georgia's, according to Kaiser Family Foundation, and from dispensing the pills by mail. And it would bar state funds from being used for a person to travel outside of Florida for an abortion, except for when it is a medical emergency or when federal law requires it.
To groups that oppose abortion, the anticipated six-week ban is a welcome victory.
''When the governor signs this, it is going to make a huge impact,'' said Ingrid Duran, director of state legislation for the National Right to Life Committee.
By contrast, Sarah Parker, president of Women's Voices of Southwest Florida, a nonprofit that defends reproductive rights, started camping out on Monday night in Tallahassee as part of a weeklong protest.
''This is going to affect millions of people,'' she said. ''And if it's not happening in your state, it will.''
Jonathan Weisman and Eduardo Medina contributed reporting.
CAPTION(S): {Note the actual photos are not included in the database I used to obtain this article}
PHOTOS: Abortion rights supporters outside City Hall in Tallahassee, Fla. The new measure would ban abortions after six weeks of pregnancy. (PHOTOGRAPH BY ALICIA DEVINE/TALLAHASSEE DEMOCRAT, VIA ASSOCIATED PRESS); Gov. Ron DeSantis before signing a 15-week abortion ban last year. He has indicated he will sign the new bill passed Thursday. (PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN RAOUX/ASSOCIATED PRESS) This article appeared in print on page A14.
3). “DeSantis quietly signs 6-week abortion ban law without ceremony after contentious state house debate”, Apr 14, 2023, Kimberly Leonard, Business Insider, at <https://www.businessinsider.com/dem-copies-disneys-power-move-in-attempt-to-stop-florida-abortion-ban-2023-4>.
(Caption: DeSantis signing the 6-weak “Heartbeat Protection Act” into law on April 13, 2023. In contrast, to his ostentatious signing ceremony for the 15-week abortion ban in April of 2022, he hid from the public for this event)
9–11 minutes
DeSantis just signed a bill into law that would make abortion illegal after six weeks.
Democrats tried to alter the bill, including by invoking a tactic Disney used to fend off DeSantis.
"If it worked for Disney, maybe it'll work for me," a Democratic lawmaker said.
Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida signed near-total abortion ban during a private ceremony at his office just before midnight on Thursday.
The governor had been on a book tour in Ohio earlier in the day, before flying back to Florida, where he was surrounded by roughly two dozen supporters. His schedule shows he's traveling to Virginia on Friday to speak at the evangelical Liberty University. Back in Florida this week, Fort Lauderdale was battling major flooding, and DeSantis activated an emergency order from afar on Thursday and phoned the Broward County mayor.
Throughout the day on Thursday, Florida Democrats pulled numerous stops to try to keep the state's abortion ban from ever taking effect, including invoking a tactic Walt Disney World successfully used in a high-profile battle earlier this year.
But in the face of a Republican supermajority in the Florida House, Democrats' more than 50 amendments failed as Florida representatives sent a six-week ban to DeSantis' desk by a vote of 70-40.
Democrats had pledged to put up a fight ahead of Thursday's debate. As part of that fight, Rep. Anna Eskamani of Orlando presented an amendment that was tied to an obscure property law to keep the abortion ban from going into effect virtually in perpetuity.
Disney successfully used the rule, which invokes England's King Charles III, to retain power of its land earlier this year following a prolonged battle with DeSantis over banning LGBTQ curriculum from classrooms.
"If it worked for Disney, maybe it'll work for me," Eskamani, who previously worked at Planned Parenthood, said on the state House floor. "Let's delay this abortion ban for as long as we can."
The amendment failed. Separately, DeSantis has pledged to continue the fight against Disney.
DeSantis is expected to launch a bid for president as early as May, and being able to tout anti-abortion policy wins while campaigning has historically been a prerequisite for a GOP primary.
But shifting public opinion on abortion could mean DeSantis would lose a general election, even if his abortion legislation helps him win the primary.
The 2024 contest will be the first presidential race since the conservative-leaning Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. During the 2022 midterms, congressional Democrats used abortion rights as a rallying cry and managed to hold onto more seats than expected. They plan to have DeSantis "own" the ban ahead of the 2024 election, according to Politico.
The implications of the Florida abortion ban on the 2024 race loomed in the background throughout the day. One lawmaker fighting for abortion rights even subtly referred to former President Donald Trump's "DeSanctimonious" nickname against the governor as she railed against the legislation.
"Keep your sanctimonious opinions for your own family," Democratic Rep. Kelly Skidmore of Boca Raton said of imposing abortion bans.
Another Democrat, Rep. Michele Rayner-Goolsby of St. Petersburg, changed the lyrics of the song "All Too Well" by singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, who is kicking off a concert series in Tampa on Thursday evening.
"They say all's well that ends well, but Florida is in a new hell," Rayner-Goolsby said.
State Rep. Fentrice Driskell speaks as Democratic lawmakers and invited speakers hold a press conference to oppose a special legislative session targeting vaccine mandates, on November 15, 2021, at the Capitol in Tallahassee, Florida. Rebecca Blackwell, File/AP Photo
Democrats tried to change the financial provisions in the bill
Florida's current abortion law, which DeSantis signed, makes abortion illegal after 15 weeks, without exceptions for rape and incest. The law is in effect but is being litigated in court because the Florida Constitution contains a right to privacy that previously has been interpreted as a right to abortion.
The six-week ban will take effect if the Florida Supreme Court upholds the 15-week ban.
DeSantis signed that bill into law amid public fanfare, with a large crowd at a church that included several speakers.
But polling the six-week abortion ban is unpopular even in Florida. A University of North Florida poll of Florida residents conducted from February 25 through March 7 found 75% of respondents either somewhat or strongly opposed the ban, including 61% of GOP residents.
The six-week ban contains abortion exceptions if a pregnancy occurred as a result of rape, incest, or human trafficking, as well as cases where a pregnancy would result in severe health complications or death, or when a fetus has a fatal fetal anomaly.
To obtain an abortion in such cases, patients would have to provide documentation including a medical record, police report, or restraining order. Last year's Florida abortion data show that, of 82,000 abortions in all, 115 occurred following a rape, seven following incest, and none performed due to human trafficking, GOP Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka of Fort Myers said, reading from a state report.
"When I drafted this bill, my intention was to protect life," she said.
Democrats presented dozens of amendments to modify the bill. They proposed a provision to allow abortions if a pregnancy were to result in mental health consequences or significant financial hardship. They also proposed renaming the bill the "Forced Pregnancy Act" and guaranteeing three months of paid parental leave.
Democrats subsequently targeted a $25 million provision in the legislation for anti-abortion "crisis pregnancy centers," which work to persuade pregnant women to give birth or choose adoption.
While the centers do provide counseling, financial assistance, and baby supplies to families, they've been derided by Democrats as "fake clinics" because many don't have healthcare providers on staff. Democrats proposed diverting the funds to other areas, including childcare, long-acting contraception, diaper and milk banks, and rape crisis centers.
An amendment barring crisis pregnancy centers from using state money to advertise their services on billboards also failed.
The House gathered for hours to debate the bill, with emotional floor speeches on both sides of the issue. Lawmakers told stories of patients who suffered serious health complications as a result of pregnancy. Some lawmakers who supported the six-week ban said they believed in going even further, but aimed the cut off at a time when an embryo's cardiac activity can be detected.
"It amounts to an outright ban," House Minority Leader Fentrice Driskell of Tampa said on the House floor. "Most women don't know they're pregnant at six weeks."
Roughly an hour into the question-and-answer portion of the bill's debate, House Speaker Paul Renner of Palm Coast kicked out protesters who gathered in the gallery after they threw ripped papers onto the floor.
Renner said he wanted "there to be passionate debate on both sides" but warned observers against shouting, jeering, or clapping early in the day. The proceedings, he said, should be held "like a courtroom."
April 14, 2023: A previous version of this story ran on April 13, 2023. It has been updated to show that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the Heartbeat Protection Act into law.
4). “Ron DeSantis knows his 6-week abortion ban could come back to haunt him — that's why he's doing it under the radar”, Apr 14, 2023, Madison Hall, Business Insider, at <https://www.businessinsider.com/ron-desantis-knows-his-new-abortion-ban-could-haunt-him-2023-4>
(Caption: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis when he was a member of the US House of Representatives. Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a new law banning abortion after 6 weeks of pregnancy.
He signed with almost no fanfare, especially compared to the crowd for his 15-week ban in 2022.
Polling show most Americans think abortion should be legal in most or all cases.
When Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis enacted a 15-week abortion ban for people who are pregnant in April 2022, it was to much fanfare, with the governor surrounded by supporters and television crews.
"This will represent the most significant protection for life in this state in a generation," Florida's governor said at the time.
Soon after, in June 2022, the US Supreme Court allowed his 15-week abortion ban to go through after it overturned the Roe v. Wade decision that granted federal protections for people in the US seeking an abortion.
A year later, when approving an even more restrictive abortion ban — this one limiting professionals from performing the procedure to six weeks of gestation — DeSantis signed the bill in the dead of night, away from the media and spotlight.
The 15-week abortion ban is still heading before the Florida Supreme Court, and if it's struck down, the six-week ban won't go into effect either.
DeSantis is expected to announce a run for president in the coming months. The Republican Party's platform is widely supportive of restricting access to abortion. So why didn't the governor arrange a similar spectacle when signing it into law instead, instead assembling only a small group and putting out a press release near midnight?
The abortion issue is bad for Republicans
Taking polling into consideration perhaps explains DeSantis' decision. According to Pew Research, the majority of Americans think that abortion should be legal in most or all cases, making it difficult for DeSantis to come out on top in the court of public opinion after signing any bills restricting access to such care.
For example, when it comes to DeSantis' six-week restriction, according to recent polling from the Public Religion Research Institute, 63% of Americans — nearly two-thirds — said they were against laws that ban abortion after a fetal heartbeat could be detected (typically around the six-week mark).
And Gen Z is now increasingly politically motivated by their concerns about restrictions on abortion, which recent polling has found is the political issue that they say concerned them most when voting.
DeSantis also enacted the six-week abortion ban less than a week after a federal judge in Texas, Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, struck down FDA approval of an abortion-inducing medication, leading to an outpouring of backlash against the judge. The PRRI poll found that 72% of Americans said they're against laws that outlaw using or receiving of FDA-approved medications used to induce an abortion.
Seeing the recent backlash against Kacsmaryk, it makes sense why DeSantis would choose to avoid publicly signing the six-week ban in order to avoid a similar fate.
Democrats have run on abortion and won
Following the reversal of Roe v. Wade in June 2022, Democrats heavily campaigned on the issue of abortion in the 2022 midterm elections.
The Republican Party and many experts at the time expected a "red wave" in the voting booths, but Democrats surprised political pundits by maintaining control of the Senate and just narrowly losing control of the House of Representatives.
More recently, voters in Wisconsin voted for liberal Judge Janet Protasiewicz — who campaigned on reproductive freedoms — in an election that likely decided the immediate future of abortion rights in the state.
With this in mind, it's understandable why DeSantis crafted such fanfare when he first signed the 15-week ban in 2022 and did nothing in 2023 for the six-week ban: the more of a spotlight he puts on the decision, the more difficult it'll be for him to win over independents and subsequently the White House in 2024.
5). “DeSantis could be walking into a general election trap on abortion: Democrats prepared to pounce after Florida governor backed a six-week abortion ban”, April 13, 2023, Sally Goldenberg & Alice Miranda Ollstein, Politico, at <https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/13/democrats-tie-anti-abortion-bill-around-desantis-swing-states-00091976?nname=florida-playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b4500000&nrid=b4685157-ada3-409f-bcdf-bbe5503e64c6&nlid=630310>.
7–9 minutes
(Caption: Gov. Ron DeSantis is banking on support in the primary from anti-abortion voters, particularly those angry at Donald Trump. | Chris duMond/Getty Images)
TALLAHASSEE — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed a new abortion ban. His Democratic opponents are preparing to use it against him.
The putative presidential hopeful signed a six-week ban that the Florida state legislature passed Thursday, and Democrats, abortion-rights groups and fundraisers who oppose the measure are eager to use it to tarnish his White House ambitions.
DeSantis is banking on support in the primary from anti-abortion voters, particularly those angry at Donald Trump. The former president faced a backlash from some conservatives when he complained that the party’s far-right position on abortion hurt the GOP in last year’s midterm election.
But a six-week ban pushes the outer boundary of anti-abortion rights proposals. And it could spell trouble for DeSantis among independents and suburban voters in a general election, if he makes it that far.
(This is a Graphical Image of the Youtube Link to this statement by Nikki Fried, the Chairperson of the Florida Democratic Party. To watch the actual video go to <https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/13/democrats-tie-anti-abortion-bill-around-desantis-swing-states-00091976?nname=florida-playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b4500000&nrid=b4685157-ada3-409f-bcdf-bbe5503e64c6&nlid=630310 >)
“We’re going to make him own this, and his agenda, everywhere he goes,” said a national Democratic operative granted anonymity to discuss party strategy. “Goes to Michigan? Abortion ban. Goes to Ohio next week? Abortion ban. And that will take different forms but we’ll hang this incredibly toxic abortion ban and his agenda around his neck with different tactics.”
The operative added that this is one of many points on which to attack DeSantis who has taken several stances on social issues that Democrats believe won’t sit well with swing voters.
A spokesman for DeSantis declined to comment for this story. But Tony Perkins, the president of the Family Research Council, told POLITICO that a six-week ban isn’t the millstone Democrats believe.
“Consensus is building across the country that once there’s a heartbeat, it’s a human being,” he said. “So the governor isn’t out of step at all. … In fact, it bolsters his standing.”
Though DeSantis has not formally entered the presidential race, the campaign to tie him to a six-week ban is already beginning, according to interviews with more than a dozen people from several battleground states.
Nascent plans include attack ads, knocking on doors in swing states where polling shows abortion has become a more prominent election issue since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June, and registering voters throughout the country.
“Planned Parenthood advocacy and political organizations will make sure everyone knows his dangerous and radical record on abortion rights,” Jenny Lawson, vice president of the Planned Parenthood Action Fund said in a statement. The organization is considering door-to-door canvassing, digital ads and direct mail, Olivia Cappello, a spokesperson said in a recent interview.
The Planned Parenthood network has poured millions of dollars into voter outreach in response to the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade last year. In the leadup to the decision, arms of the organization announced a $16 million ad campaign, and spent more than $50 million on the 2022 midterms a few months later.
The head of the much smaller Women’s Voices of Southwest Florida organization, who rallied against the ban in the state capital this week, has also promised an aggressive voter outreach effort.
“We have all vowed to go knock on doors and go to other states to let people know what DeSantis has done to Florida,” Sarah Parker of the organization said in an interview. “We don’t have a lot of money, but we’ll mobilize.”
DeSantis does not share that problem. A PAC supporting his likely candidacy boasted of raising $30 million several weeks ago, and he’s proven himself a prodigious fundraiser in the past — a benefit that’s helped him cement himself as the leading Republican alternative to Trump.
And for many on the right, particularly those miffed at Trump, DeSantis’ support of a six-week ban is proof that he is a more reliable ally in their fight to end the procedure nationwide.
“I’ve known him since he hit the ground in Congress,” Perkins said. “He, from the start, has been making very solid decisions on a host of policy issues, from religious freedom to economic issues.”
Florida’s six-week abortion ban received final legislative approval as the issue of abortion access once again dominates the headlines. The U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday agreed to allow the abortion pill mifepristone to remain on the market but with restrictions that will hamper access to millions of people unless the Supreme Court intervenes.
Florida now joins at least 12 other states — including Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky and Louisiana — that have approved bans on abortions after six weeks, a point at which many people don’t yet know they’re pregnant.
“This bill is atrocious,” said Ryan Stitzlein, NARAL’s senior national political director. “This issue may ignite a small part of their primary base but it’s deeply unpopular with voters in this country. … We’re activating our more than 4 million members across the country. They’ll be making calls, writing, knocking on doors.”
Democrats’ confidence is rooted in both public polling that demonstrates little bipartisan appetite for such strict abortion bans as well as recent case studies. Five months after Republicans failed to deliver widespread victories in the midterm elections, a Democratic candidate for the Wisconsin Supreme Court defeated her opponent by 11 points in a race centered around abortion. Even moderate Republicans crossed the aisle to donate to her winning campaign.
(This is a Graphical Image of the Youtube Link to this statement by Janet Protasiewicz, who recently won the hotly contested race for the Wisconsin Supreme Court. To watch the actual video go to <https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/13/democrats-tie-anti-abortion-bill-around-desantis-swing-states-00091976?nname=florida-playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b4500000&nrid=b4685157-ada3-409f-bcdf-bbe5503e64c6&nlid=630310 >)
“You should ignore national polls because that’s not how people win a presidential nomination. They win by winning each state and if you look at the bellwether states that Trump or DeSantis need to win, they have major, major problems on the issue of abortion,” political consultant Patrick Guarasci — who worked on the winning campaign of Wisconsin Supreme Court candidate Janet Protasiewicz — said in an interview this week. “They’re being held hostage by their donors and their far-right-wing extremists.”
Guarasci said abortion ranked as the top issue in the recent election.
“Trump or DeSantis will have a hard time winning a presidential elections without some kind of answer to that question,” he added.
Several dozen opponents have been staging demonstrations in Tallahassee, even getting arrested in acts of civil disobedience. Though they knew they stood no chance of changing the course of the bill, they continued to gather as recently as Wednesday night to denounce it. State Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried warned DeSantis will “will not stop with Florida.”
DeSantis isn’t the only Republican who will face pressure for his stance on abortion. Democrats are certain to note that Trump appointed the justices who overturned Roe. Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), on his second day of campaigning since announcing a presidential exploratory committee, pivoted, deflected and avoided specifics when repeatedly pressed on where he stood on federal abortion restrictions.
(This is a Graphical Image of the Youtube Link to this Tim Scott statement. To watch the actual video go to <https://www.politico.com/news/2023/04/13/democrats-tie-anti-abortion-bill-around-desantis-swing-states-00091976?nname=florida-playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b4500000&nrid=b4685157-ada3-409f-bcdf-bbe5503e64c6&nlid=630310 >)
But unlike Trump or Scott, DeSantis will have signed legislation limiting access. Democrats don’t intend to let voters forget.
“This man is clearly wrong for Michigan,” Michigan Lieutenant Gov. Garlin Gilchrist, a Democrat, said on a conference call ahead of DeSantis’ recent visit to the state. “But he is also wrong for America. He will be burdened by his anti-choice, anti-woman, anti-reproductive freedom stances.”
No comments:
Post a Comment