Court's abortion rulings produce mixed reactions from both sides in Polk County

The Florida Supreme Court managed to provoke consternation for advocates on both sides of the abortion debate with its twin rulings released Monday.

Opponents of abortion cheered the court’s decision affirming a 15-week limit on abortions, a ruling that allows an even stricter ban to take effect soon. But they lamented the 4-3 vote in which justices allowed a proposed constitutional amendment guaranteeing abortion rights to be placed on the ballot for November.

Proponents of abortion rights celebrated the latter decision while decrying the court’s ruling that will enact a six-week ban passed last year that has been on hold amid the legal challenges to the previous law.

“Definitely a bittersweet scenario out of the Supreme Court yesterday,” said Taylor Aguilera, a Lakeland resident who serves as statewide organizing director for Floridians Protecting Freedom, the political group that led the petition drive for the proposed constitutional amendment.

The dual decisions set up what will likely be a costly and contentious, seven-month campaign leading to the Nov. 5 election. Barring a delay from further legal actions, Florida will adopt a six-week abortion ban next month, and Floridians will have the capacity to scuttle it if at least 60% of voters favor Amendment 4 in the general election.

'My heart's just grieved by it'

Rebecca Klein, executive director at A Woman’s Choice, a pregnancy care center in Lakeland, was not in a mood to exult over the court ruling that will trigger the six-week abortion ban.

“To be honest, this is a very personal response, but my heart’s just grieved by it,” Klein said. “Because, I think, the juxtaposition of the two decisions, and the situation that puts us in, only illuminates the great division, not only in our state but in our country. And it's sad to me that we are so opposed, and there's such a fight.”

A Woman’s Choice provides such services as pregnancy testing and ultrasounds but does not offer or recommend abortions. It offers referrals to support girls and women facing unintended pregnancies. It is not part of a statewide network of pregnancy centers that receive government funding,

Klein said such centers will face increased demand as the six-week abortion ban takes effect.

“In 30 days, we could be dealing with a radical shift, and fast-forward seven months, it could be overturned” by the vote on the constitutional amendment, she said. “So it's just, I think, a very tumultuous time for the pro-life movement.”

Klein said she will spend the next seven months trying to communicate what the effects of the amendment would be. She considers the language of the ballot measure misleading.

The ballot summary states that no law will restrict abortion “before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” Viability, the stage at which a fetus can survive outside the womb, is generally considered to be 24 weeks of gestation.

But Klein believes that the qualifications would allow “full-term abortions.” She said the phrase “healthcare provider” is vague and not limited to medical doctors.

“I am still deeply concerned about the amendment,” Klein said. “I was surprised by the Supreme Court's decision, I thought that the case for the concerns with the amendment was strong. … I still feel that it's a mistake for that to be on the ballot and potentially voted to be embedded in our Constitution.”

Jon Friedt, pastor at Believers Fellowship Church in Lakeland and an anti-abortion advocate, said the court’s tandem rulings left him “befuddled.”

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“They’re so diametrically opposed, it’s just kind of odd,” he said. “I don't understand how that happens. But I applaud the decision for upholding the 15-week ban, which affirms the six-week ban as well. So I applaud that. Rather disappointed that they are allowing the other thing to go to the ballot.”

Like Klein, Friedt said he thinks proponents of the amendment used deceptive tactics in gathering the nearly 900,000 signatures needed to place the measure on the ballot. He suspects that many who signed petitions did not realize what the impact of the amendment would be.

Friedt said he thinks that the amendment’s language would allow late-term abortions. He said that he will work to ensure that voters are “educated” on the implications of the measure.

“So my prayer, obviously, is that Amendment 4 is not overlooked at all and that the population sees what it really is and that they overwhelmingly vote no,” Friedt said. “At that point, I think it will be a clarion call to our politicians, and it should be also to Planned Parenthood and those who, for whatever reason, like to murder unborn babies, it should be a clarion call to them to say the people don't want abortion, at least in general.”

'That bill was absolutely constitutional'

Former state Sen. Kelli Stargel, a Lakeland Republican, sponsored the Senate version of the 15-week abortion limit that passed in 2022 and was signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

“I’m very glad that they (justices) read that and saw it the way we did, that that bill was absolutely constitutional,” Stargel said.

The court had previously determined that a privacy clause in the state constitution ensured the right to an abortion. Stargel praised the current majority for breaking with that precedent.

“I’m glad we went through that process, and I’m glad the court had the opportunity to review it,” she said. “It was just very clear that the Legislature, in my opinion, does have the right to come in and put safety precautions around all health care, regardless, and abortions shouldn’t be treated separately.”

But Stargel said she is concerned about the prospect that Floridians could negate the law by passing Amendment 4.

“This ballot initiative is so incredibly vague, it’s scary,” she said. “I’m afraid the public, even if they read that, aren’t going to understand the nuances. I hope we have an opportunity to inform the public. Vote how you will, but you need to have good information, and I’m just afraid that’s not going to happen.”

Florida Rep. Jennifer Canady, R-Lakeland, co-sponsored the bill last year that imposed a six-week ban on abortions, with extremely limited exceptions. Her husband, Charles Canady, was among the four Supreme Court justices who both affirmed the law and ruled that the ballot measure met state requirements.

Jennifer Canady, who is in line to become Florida House Speaker in 2028, did not respond to a voicemail left Tuesday morning.

'The 15-week case is absolutely heartbreaking'

Aguilera, who previously worked for Planned Parenthood, said she became a full-time employee Monday of Floridians Protecting Freedom, which is now using the name “Yes on 4.” Aguilera said she was confident that the ballot measure met the state’s requirements for being clear and having a single subject.

“The 15-week case is absolutely heartbreaking, though,” Aguilera said. “That, of course, triggers that 30-day countdown to the implementation of the six-week ban. It’s absolutely going to turn into a scenario where patients are going to be forced to leave the state if they are going to need to receive any sort of abortion care.”

Advocates note that most girls and women don’t realize they are pregnant at six weeks after their last menstrual cycle.

Aguilera said the prospect of the six-week ban adds urgency to her efforts to see the constitutional amendment gain 60% approval. She said that Floridians Protecting Freedom is hiring staff to launch both physical and virtual outreach to voters, and she expects to travel the state through Nov. 5.

“We are running a non-partisan campaign,” Aguilera said. “We want to make it clear that this is not a Democratic-turnout mechanism, and any sort of claim of that is a losing message. We have been doing a lot of intentional work, making sure that we remain nonpartisan and that we are reaching out to nonpartisan, Republican voters, Democratic voters, it doesn't matter what party affiliation they come from. This issue affects the women in their lives.”

Bonnie Patterson-James, an abortion-rights advocate with the Pro-Choice Action League, denounced the court’s ruling to affirm the 15-week ban.

“I just couldn't believe they would do it on April Fool's Day,” she said. “That, to me, was a new level of cruelty, even for our Florida government. … I said when they overturned Roe at the Supreme Court that it was heartbreaking, gut-wrenching and sad. Now I'm just angry. It was an egregious error and overriding precedent again.”

She referred to previous decisions in which the Supreme Court found that a decades-old privacy clause in the state constitution protected abortion rights.

Will it motivate voters?

Patterson-James is running for the Florida House as a Democrat against Canady. She said the court’s decision, by bringing the six-week ban into effect, will motivate many Floridians to vote for the proposed amendment.

“We showed that with getting the petition signed,” she said. “It was NPA (no party affiliation), Republicans, men, women, trans, gay — everybody was signing the petition. We weren't having to ask, ‘Are you a Democrat? Are you female?’ It was everyone that believed in personal freedom and bodily autonomy was signing the petition.”

Tsi Day Smyth, a former Winter Haven resident, serves as vice president for Voices of Florida, a nonprofit based in Sarasota that describes itself as promoting reproductive freedom and human rights. The group is part of a coalition that worked to get the proposed amendment on the ballot.

Smyth was arrested last year in Tallahassee during a protest of the six-week abortion bill, along with Florida Sen. Lauren Book, D-Plantation, and Nikki Fried, now chair of the Florida Democratic Party. Smyth dismissed suggestions that Floridians might be confused by the intent of the ballot measure, an argument made in legal challenges.

“Honestly, I think we need to have more faith in the people, instead of having so little faith in the people of Florida that we try to take power away from them and keep giving it to legislation,” they said. “And that's been an ongoing problem. And I am incredibly excited that, come November, Floridians are going to be able to take the power into their own hands. They are going to have a voice on their own bodily autonomy, which is so important and it's such a basic human right.”

Donna Windsor of Lakeland is active with the Pro-Choice Action League and volunteers as a patient escort at the Lakeland Women’s Health Center, the only facility in Polk County that performs elective abortions. Windsor predicted that the enactment of the six-week ban will increase support for the constitutional amendment.

“For some people, they don't change because they saw the light, they change because they felt the heat,” Windsor said. “So some people might have ignored it or not shown up and not voted. But now, with the six-week ban and the direct impact they're going to see on the women in their lives, they're going to be more inclined to say, ‘Wait a second. This is not okay.’ ”

Windsor expressed confidence that the ballot measure will top the 60% threshold. She noted the success of similar initiatives in other states.

“It has been a driving decision maker in other states, and I'm hoping that we're going to have that here,” she said. “I feel confident that we can. I think it will also help us to get a legislature that is more pro-everyday Floridians and not catering to special interest groups that don't have the Floridians’ best interests at heart.”

Gary White can be reached at gary.white@theledger.com or 863-802-7518. Follow on X @garywhite13.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Abortion rulings yield mixed reactions from both sides in Polk County