Florida House PASSES six-week abortion ban backed by Ron DeSantis

The Florida House voted overwhelmingly on Thursday to ban abortions in the state after six weeks of pregnancy.

The vote was 70-40 in a body that skews heavily Republican.

However, with only 35 Democratic seats, some GOP lawmakers joined the opposition.

The law is essentially a total ban on abortions, as most women don’t realize they are pregnant until after six weeks.

Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis supports the bill and has said he will sign it.

It previously passed the Florida state senate.

Earlier Thursday, there was chaos in the Capitol when protesters flooded the building.

There were protesters seen yelling and throwing handfuls of stickers and small scraps of paper at lawmakers as they entered the House chamber.

According to local reports, the stickers provided information on how to receive abortion pills through the mail.

Once DeSantis signs the bill into law, Florida will have one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the country.

The state already has a ban on abortion after 15 weeks, which is being challenged in the Florida Supreme Court.

It is not yet clear when a decision will be made in that case.

During the debate over the six-week ban, Democratic lawmakers proposed more than 50 amendments to the bill, but also acknowledged the uphill battle they faced in the Republican-controlled legislature.

But House Speaker Paul Renner, a Republican, spent the afternoon rushing that process, giving each amendment about a minute before calling a vote, declaring the amendment failed, and moving on to the next.

Some observers in the gallery booed and shouted at his actions. “This is all just circus politics,” cried one.

Renner pushed back, warning observers that it is a privilege to watch the proceedings and reminding them that he can have the galleries emptied.

By noon those galleries were empty due to disturbances.

State Representative Anna Eskamani, a Democrat, proposed an amendment that would delay the enactment of the ban under the King Charles Clause.

The amendment would keep the state’s current law in effect until ’21 years after the death of the last survivor of the descendants of King Charles III, King of England, living at the date of this declaration’.

This ‘last survivor’ is the year-old Princess Lilibet of Sussex, who lives in California.

Disney used the clause to evade DeSantis’ attempt to take control of its theme parks.

“If it works for Disney, it might work for me,” Eskamani said.

The amendment failed.

She also suggested renaming the bill “Forced Pregnancy Act.”

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

“It will force people into pregnancy before they realize they are pregnant,” she added.

The amendment failed.

“This is a devastating vote,” Eskamani later said to the audience. “We may be the minority in this room, but we’re not the minority out there.”

The bill does have exceptions for rape, incest and human trafficking up to 15 weeks of pregnancy.

There is an exception for the life of the mother if two doctors declare in writing that the woman will die if she continues the pregnancy.

House Rep. Allison Tant told a story about how her mother almost died in pregnancy while living in rural North Carolina and the same outcome would happen to women in rural Florida if it took two doctors to decide whether a pregnancy could be terminated .

The bill also allocates $25 million for nonmedical anti-abortion clinics, which essentially promote pregnancy.

Florida only funds $3 million a year to rape crisis centers.

Florida’s gender and racial party differences were on full display as lawmakers debated the issue all afternoon.

Women Democratic legislators spoke out against the bill, receiving some help from black Democratic men. White male Republicans pushed for it to pass.

“I’m going to say the quiet part out loud now to all the mistresses of rich men in Florida, sis, don’t go on the trip,” said state representative Ashley Gantt. “Is that baby okay?”

“Make sure you deny that trip,” she continued. “Get a headache or something or you’re just not available – put your phone on Do Not Disturb.”

Gantt said the legislation would affect the have-nots more than the haves in the Sunshine State.

Republican Representative Shane Abbott, who has an adopted son, encouraged lawmakers to vote in favor of the abortion ban.

“It is a third-degree felony to damage sea turtle eggs. It is a third degree misdemeanor to damage crocodile eggs. So we’re willing to protect an unborn alligator and an unborn sea turtle, but we’re sitting here today debating whether it’s worth protecting an unborn human,” he argued.

He claimed nearly 80,000 abortions that took place in Florida last year were “in no way related to health care.”

“They were about convenience,” he said. “They were about quality of life.”

Rep. Dianne Hart, a Democrat, recalled how one of her high school friends got pregnant in 1971, before Roe v. Wade.

“She chose to take quinine in the hope that she would terminate her pregnancy,” Hart recalls. “Except that she took her own life.”

Hart warned Florida would return to the “dark ages” if the bill passes.

Rep. Felicia Simone Robinson, another Democrat, said “this is about control – trying to control women.”

“If they take this right away from us, who’s to say that one day we don’t have the right to vote or one day we don’t have the right to go to work,” Robinson said.

Democratic Representative Christopher Benjamin argued that taking away a woman’s choice makes pregnancy a “sentence.”

“It’s a punishment,” he remarked.

Democratic Representative Jervonte Edwards got a few fits of laughter when he said on the floor, “The underlying truth is we all love sex here whether it’s with or without a condom, but the key to that is that as a man I can’t have a condom . child.’

He pointed out that the male legislators would not be interested in a law imposed by the women in the body that would “make all men barren.”

As the debate drew to a close, Republicans allowed three of their female legislators to speak.

Republican Rep. Dana Trabulsy explained that her anti-abortion beliefs stemmed from her own decision to have an abortion as an adult — when she “knew better” — and later regretted it.

She argued that women who want to have an abortion are in that position “because they made an irresponsible choice.”

“Who is going to hear the voices of the unborn?” she asked her colleagues.

Republican Representative Jennifer Canady argued that the funding in the bill would help reluctant mothers.

In closing before the GOP, Representative Jenna Persons-Mulicka stood up and said, “Members, today we have the opportunity to lead.”

“We have the opportunity to lead the national debate on the importance of protecting life and giving every child the chance to be born and find his or her purpose,” said Persons-Mulicka.

“With your vote today, we are turning the culture of abortion into a culture of life,” she said, receiving applause from her Republican colleagues.

When she finished, counting the votes took less than a minute.

The Florida legislature currently has 119 members and thus nine legislators abstained.

As of January 2023, 24 states have issued or are in the process of issuing restrictive bans.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, 12 states maintain near-total bans on abortion, with very limited exceptions.

Four states have laws banning abortion after a certain point in pregnancy, which would have been unconstitutional under Roe.