“Women have been stripped of their rights and access to lifesaving healthcare,” warned one Democratic lawmaker. “Women will undoubtedly die. This is not freedom.”

By Brett Wilkins.  Published 4-13-2023 by Common Dreams

 EDITOR‘S NOTE: The bill was signed last evening.

Reproductive rights defenders on Thursday braced for a near-total abortion ban in Florida as Republican state lawmakers sent legislation outlawing the medical procedure after six weeks to governor and likely GOP presidential candidate Ron DeSantis‘ desk for his all-but-certain signature.

S.B. 300 passed in the Florida House of Representatives by a 70-40 vote largely along party lines after approval by the GOP-controlled Senate earlier this month. If signed into law as anticipated, the legislation will replace an existing 2022 Florida law prohibiting abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy with a six-week ban containing exceptions for victims of rape, incest, or human trafficking; in cases of fatal fetal abnormalities; or to save the pregnant person’s life.

Jezebel reports Republican state lawmakers rejected an amendment to include an exception for a life-threatening condition that recently caused a woman to miscarry in a hair salon and nearly bleed to death. The woman, Anya Cook, is Black; this week is Black Maternal Health Week.

This is Anya Cook's story https://t.co/Ds6SgTVbpH

— Laura Bassett (@LEBassett) April 13, 2023

DeSantis, who is widely expected to seek the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, has promised to sign the six-week ban into law.

“I’ve said…we’re for pro-life,” the governor said last month. “I urged the legislature to work, produce good stuff, and we will sign.”

S.B. 300 is written so that it will become law if the Florida Supreme Court affirms the 15-week ban. The court is expected to hear a case involving that ban in the coming months.

The Florida legislature just sent a 6 week abortion ban to the Governors desk.

TO BE CLEAR: Abortion remains legal in Florida until 15 weeks.

This bill will not go into effect until 30 days after the FL Supreme Court undermines our right to privacy.

— Florida Planned Parenthood Action (@PPactionFL) April 13, 2023

Responding to Thursday’s vote, Florida Senate Minority Leader Lauren Book (D-32) tweeted that “Florida Republicans have now passed a dangerous abortion ban through both the House and the Senate—choosing to disregard the pleas of women and the doctors entrusted with their care, including two mothers in my own district forced to the brink of death following miscarriages due to the state’s current restrictive laws.”

“Now, things will get much worse,” she added. “Women have been stripped of their rights and access to lifesaving healthcare. Women will undoubtedly die. This is not freedom.”

Florida Republican just passed the most extreme abortion ban in Florida history. This is an incredibly sad and painful day for our state but we will not stop, or be deterred in the fight for reproductive justice and personal freedom.

Our full statement: pic.twitter.com/lMDNF5nM9o

— Rep. Anna V. Eskamani 🔨 (@AnnaForFlorida) April 13, 2023

Florida state Rep. Anna Eskamani (D-47) took to the legislature floor in pre-vote debate Thursday to propose an amendment to rename S.B. 300, officially the Pregnancy and Parenting Support Act.

“Members,” she said, “this amendment renames the bill to the Forced Pregnancy Act, which is basically what it does.”

Abortion rights defenders—some of whom were joined by Democratic Florida lawmakers in an impromptu singing of “Lean on Me” in the State Capitol after Thursday’s vote—also warned that the six-week ban poses life-and-death risks to Floridians.

FL House cleared the gallery because the public, who got 30 seconds or 15 seconds in committee to speak on this bill, continue to express their opposition from the gallery

Lawmakers have joined the public in singing Lean on Me outside of the Florida House

We are all we’ve got. pic.twitter.com/Pgu4xINPRB

— Florida Planned Parenthood Action (@PPactionFL) April 13, 2023

“Across the country, pregnant people are being pushed to the brink of death because they can’t get an abortion. Yet Florida lawmakers have rushed this dangerous ban through the legislature with no concern for their citizens and how it will harm them,” Elisabeth Smith, director of state policy and advocacy at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in a statement.

“This bill threatens to end abortion almost entirely amid a growing public health crisis,” she continued. “If this ban takes effect, Floridians would be stranded in a vast abortion desert and forced to travel over 1,000 miles to get an abortion. No one should have to face that, and many people will not be able to make that journey.”

Common Dreams previously reported the ordeal of Nancy Davis, a Louisiana woman forced to carry a fetus with a fatal skull deformity inside her body for six months and then make a 2,500-mile round trip to New York in order to obtain an abortion.

“We also must remember,” Smith added, “that Mifepristone is under attack, and if that pill is taken off the market, it will become even harder to get an abortion before six weeks.”

It's hard to overstate what a big deal this is.

Once Florida's bill takes effect (anticipated this summer), the Carolinas are the only states in the southeast with abortion legal past 6 weeks.

There aren't enough clinics for all the patients who will seek abortions. https://t.co/u0tEzdyYGb

— Shefali Luthra (@shefalil) April 13, 2023

Although a panel of the right-wing 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal on Thursday temporarily blocked a Texas federal judge’s invalidation of the government’s approval of mifepristone—one of two drugs typically taken in tandem to induce medical abortion—reproductive rights campaigners warned that the ruling still poses a grave threat.

Earlier this week, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) contended that if the U.S. Supreme Court hears the Texas case and the court’s right-wing supermajority upholds the ruling, “it would essentially institute a national abortion ban.”

Kara Gross, the ACLU of Florida’s legislative director and senior policy counsel, said that “in a state that prides itself on being free, this is an unprecedented and unacceptable level of government overreach and intrusion.”

No one should be forced to carry a pregnancy against their will. pic.twitter.com/rLdRr9oJxX

— ACLU of Florida (@ACLUFL) April 13, 2023

“This near-total abortion ban will effectively eliminate legal abortion care in Florida,” Gross continued. “It will force hundreds of thousands of pregnant people to have to travel out of state to seek the care they need. Others will be forced to remain pregnant against their will and endure labor and delivery and all of the significant medical risks associated with pregnancy and birth. “

“Floridians deserve better from their elected leaders who are responsible for representing their voices and protecting their freedoms,” she asserted. “The government should never be able to force anyone to carry a pregnancy against their will. Every Floridian deserves access to health care and the right to make personal decisions about their own lives, families, and futures.”

My statement on the final passage of Florida’s extreme six-week abortion ban — pic.twitter.com/L4lHsUhfmS

— Daniella Levine Cava (@LevineCava) April 13, 2023

NARAL Pro-Choice America president Mini Timmaraju said in a statement that “this ban is dangerous, plain and simple. It will not only cut off abortion access for Floridians but the countless people who have sought care there as extremists in their own states enforce bans.”

“Ron DeSantis talks about the ‘Free State of Florida,’ but it’s clear that if he signs this bill as he has signaled he will, he’ll be selling out our freedoms for his own personal ambition, stooping to new lows to win the 2024 GOP primary,” Timmaraju added. “He should have listened in November when voters made it clear they don’t support abortion bans—he can count on hearing it again when he’s on the ballot next.”

This work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0)