News Roundup
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FL Legislature honors women by taking away their autonomy and control over their bodies
By Diane Roberts
Florida Phoenix
Babies! Here in Florida, we love us some babies. Unless they’re already born.
Last state House committee hearing on 15-week abortion ban; next stop is a vote in the full House
By Imani Thomas
Florida Phoenix
House Bill 5, the proposed 15-week abortion ban that has rattled the abortion rights movement, continues to make its way through the Florida Legislature, despite Democratic lawmakers and activists fighting against the legislation.
House ready to vote on 15-week abortion bill
By Jason Delgado
Florida Politics
The committee-level fights over a bill that would prohibit abortion in Florida after 15 weeks of pregnancy are finished.
Fla. Republicans ditch Texas-style abortion law for what they call a ‘generous’ 15-week
By Caroline Kitchener
Washington Post
It took just one day after Texas enacted its controversial “heartbeat bill,” banning abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, for a top Florida Republican to endorse passing the same law in his state — with the leader of the state Senate declaring that a similar measure was “something we’re already working on.”
Abortion rights supporters say Florida’s proposed 15-week ban would hurt the financially vulnerable
By Cathy Carter
WUSF Tampa Bay
A measure that would ban abortions in Florida after 15 weeks is quickly advancing through the state legislature.
State politicians should stay out of private health decisions, especially regarding abortion
By Lillian Tamayo
Palm Beach Post
As the midpoint of Florida’s legislative session nears, the Republican majority is prioritizing passage of an abortion ban like the Mississippi law currently before the U.S. Supreme Court.
How Florida’s 15-week abortion bill would have hurt two of my patients
By Dr. Rachel Rapkin
Tampa Bay Times
For eight years, I have worked as an OB/GYN in Florida. During that time I have cared for thousands of patients, providing life-saving and life-affirming reproductive health services.
Family doctor takes stand against 15-week abortion ban
Dr. Anna Lowell
Fort Myers News-Press
As a family doctor in Florida who cares deeply about reproductive healthcare access, I stand firmly against our state’s proposed 15-week abortion ban (HB 5/SB 146).
Florida lawmakers, hands off abortion rights
By Adele Guadalupe
Palm Beach Post
In one state after another, anti-abortion laws are being proposed and passed. Where is the equity in these bills?
Florida Republicans think they can trick people into supporting their wildly restrictive abortion ban because it’s not as bad as Texas’s
By Bess Levin
Vanity Fair
If you were an alien learning about the United States from your mother planet, and the only things you were told were that it was the richest country in the world, that a very important ruling from the highest court in the land had given pregnant people the right to decide what to do with their own bodies (through the 24th week) for the last 49 years, and that, in fact, women were autonomous individuals and not property of the government, you’d probably assume that there was no such thing as an “abortion debate,” and that people who found themselves pregnant and not wanting to be were allowed to make their own decisions in consult with a medical professional.
Florida Republicans are trying to paint a 15-week abortion ban as ‘generous’
By Laura Clawson
Daily Kos
The Texas abortion vigilante law isn’t just dodging the oversight of the courts, it’s helping Republicans redefine what’s a “moderate” abortion ban. Case in point: Florida.
Democrat lawmaker fights for exemptions in abortion legislation in cases including rape, incest and human trafficking
By Regan McCarthy
WFSU Tallahassee
A Florida lawmaker and childhood sexual abuse survivor is pushing back on a measure that would ban most abortions after 15 weeks.
This is my plea: Leave access to safe and legal abortion alone
By Melinda Isley
Fort Myers News-Press
When I got my period at the age of 10 in 1980 and became a “woman”, my mom explained what Roe v. Wade meant.
No Abortion Ban Is ‘Generous,’ Despite What Republicans May Say
By Kylie Cheung
Jezebel
Florida state legislators are in the process of fast-tracking a 15-week abortion ban—which mirrors Mississippi’s bill currently before the Supreme Court—to the desk of Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), who’s already expressed his support for it.
DeSantis Could Be Haunted by Florida’s ‘Generous’ Abortion Ban
By Ed Kilgore
New York Magazine
The expectation that the U.S. Supreme Court will reverse Roe v. Wade and abandon any federal constitutional right to an abortion by June or July has unsurprisingly excited people in the anti-abortion movement, while alarming their pro-choice opponents.
Abortion bill hits hardest at the most vulnerable
Editorial
Orlando Sentinel
As an anti-abortion bill moves through the Legislature, it’s becoming clear that Florida lawmakers are all too willing to play politics with the bodies of vulnerable women.
Experts say Biden could use executive powers to protect abortion access
By Shefali Luthra
The 19th
With legislation shoring up abortion access unlikely to pass Congress and the Supreme Court poised to scale back protections, the Biden administration appears unlikely to fulfill its promises to expand and protect abortion access — unless, as some advocates are calling for him to do, he uses executive powers.
People Are Getting Creative Obtaining Abortion Pills Online
By Carrie N. Baker
Ms. Magazine
As the Supreme Court has allowed the Texas abortion ban to stand and is now poised to overturn Roe v. Wade this summer, people in states with restrictive abortion laws are finding creative ways to obtain abortion pills online, made easier by a recent increase in telemedicine abortion providers in many states.
Abortions in Texas fell 60% in 1st month under new limits
By Paul J. Weber
Associated Press
Abortions in Texas fell by 60% in the first month under the most restrictive abortion law in the U.S. in decades, according to new figures that for the first time reveal a full accounting of the immediate impact.
Appeals court rules in Biden’s favor on abortion referrals
By Julie Carr Smyth
Associated Press
Federally funded family planning clinics can continue to make abortion referrals for now, a federal court ruled Tuesday, in a setback for a dozen Republican attorneys general who have sued to restore a Trump-era ban on the practice.
Millions in tax dollars flow to anti-abortion centers in US
By Kimberlee Kruesi
Associated Press
Anti-abortion centers across the country are receiving tens of millions of tax dollars to talk women out of ending their pregnancies, a nearly fivefold increase from a decade ago that resulted from an often-overlooked effort by mostly Republican-led states.
The threat to Roe v. Wade is driving a religious movement for reproductive choice
By Michelle Boorstein
Washington Post
When the Rev. Kaeley McEvoy began at Westmoreland Congregational in 2018 she faced a question: Should she tell her new congregation she’d recently had an abortion?
Why 2021 Was a ‘Watershed Year’ for Reproductive Justice
By Eleanor J. Bader
The Progressive
Despite the looming threat that the U.S. Supreme Court will overturn Roe v. Wade this summer, Andrea Miller, president of the National Institute for Reproductive Health, does not want to dwell on gloom and doom.
Abortion clinics in liberal U.S. states expand, brace for more patients
By Sharon Bernstein
Reuters
Abortion providers in liberal states are expanding clinics, training more staff and boosting travel assistance to prepare for an influx of patients from conservative states if the U.S. Supreme Court ends the constitutional right to the procedure.