The Florida Supreme Court on Monday ruled 6-1 that privacy protections in the state constitution do not extend to abortion, a stunning reversal of its own decades-old precedent that will allow a six-week ban to take effect on May 1, the Florida Phoenix reported. The decision stemmed from a 2022 lawsuit that challenged the constitutionality of a 15-week ban approved by lawmakers following the demise of Roe v. Wade, a seismic shift the justices said affected the breadth of abortion protections in Florida.
“We conclude there is no basis under the Privacy Clause to invalidate the statute,” Justice Jamie Grosshans wrote for the majority. “In doing so, we recede from our prior decisions in which — relying on reasoning the U.S. Supreme Court has rejected — we held that the Privacy Clause guaranteed the right to receive an abortion through the end of the second trimester.”
The 15-week ban will narrow automatically under a “trigger” ban, effectively curtailing abortion access in the South while increasing the workload for blue-state providers who are already struggling to keep pace with demand.
But it may not be permanent. In a separate decision, the high court ruled 4-3 that a proposal to enshrine abortion rights in the constitution can appear on the November ballot, giving voters the opportunity to overturn the ban just six months after it takes effect. Together, the decisions place abortion squarely at the center of the 2024 election, offering Democrats a ready-made platform in a key state where they’ve fared abysmally for more than a decade.
“Today’s rulings prove exactly what is at stake at the ballot box,” Nikki Fried, head of the Florida Democratic Party, said in a statement. “Over 1 million Floridians signed the petition to get Amendment 4 on the ballot, and that same politically diverse coalition will ensure Florida remains a beacon of freedom in the South.”
The Biden campaign seized on that messaging Tuesday in a new TV ad highlighting Donald Trump’s record on abortion, which consists mostly of appointing three right-wing Supreme Court justices and then bragging about their role in decimating reproductive rights for millions of people, per the Phoenix.
“Because for 54 years they were trying to get Roe v. Wade terminated – and I did it,” Trump says in the ad. “And I’m proud to have done it.”
Trump has indicated support for a federal abortion ban at 15 weeks of pregnancy, a wholly arbitrary time period Republicans have selected as a “compromise” restriction in hopes of wooing moderates and abortion rights advocates. In Trump parlance, that means “people” (not just Republicans) are “agreeing on” (not being told to consider) 15 weeks. (People are not agreeing on 15 weeks.)
“The number of weeks, now, people are agreeing on 15, and I’m thinking in terms of that, and it’ll come out to something that’s very reasonable,” Trump said last month during a radio interview. “But people are really — even hard-liners are agreeing, seems to be 15 weeks, seems to be a number that people are agreeing at. But I’ll make that announcement at the appropriate time.”
The TV spot is part of a $30 million ad buy in battleground states, a category that now officially includes Florida. (I am shook. I am also skeptical.) It’ll run during “high-viewership prime programming” on a host of cable networks and on digital platforms like YouTube and Instagram, the campaign said.
Similar attack-ad fodder is up for grabs in Michigan, where a Republican legislative candidate was caught on tape detailing his opposition to abortion “without exception.” If Josh Powell triumphs in a special election this month, he’d also be down to repeal the state’s landmark abortion law, according to a recording obtained by the Michigan Advance.
Of course, Powell, a GOP state House hopeful, couldn’t actually repeal the policy — at least not without the approval of a majority of Michigan voters, who approved it as a constitutional amendment less than two years ago. Powell acknowledged as much at a GOP event last month, telling an attendee that the measure “kind of takes away the choice in the legislature.”
“But if there’s any opportunities to go that route,” he added on the recording. “I mean, right now all I can really do is stand in the way of expanding it, but I mean, if there’s opportunities that come up, you know, if people want to revisit. … I know there’s already things underway to … revisit Prop 3, put it back on the ballot, you know, that sort of thing. So yeah. I mean, if we can get something with enough signatures, then I can, you know, we can pass it through the House without having to go through the voting process.”
I’m not really sure what “voting process” he’s referring to, but it doesn’t really matter. Unless it’s overturned by the courts (doubtful), there is literally no way to undo — or even alter — the abortion law without having voters weigh in. Lawmakers can initiate that process, either by convening a constitutional convention or by passing a legislative joint resolution, but even then, voters have final approval.
Powell might understand this, to be fair — at least twice, he clarified that he’d be limited in his ability to enact policy in line with his “personal” pro-life views — but I don’t know for sure, because he declined to elaborate. No one who spoke to him at the event indicated they were recording the conversation, he said. And sure, that’s legal in Michigan, but that doesn’t make it not sketchy.
“I have no idea who this is or what you are talking about but if someone is secretly recording me that is extremely inappropriate, disrespectful, and just plain creepy,” he said via email. “I will be blocking this email now and not responding to this harassment any further.”
