Florida’s high-court abortion ruling just added to GOP heartburn

Reproductive rights advocates gather in front of Florida’s old Capitol building to protest an abortion bill. Oct. 2, 2021. Credit: Danielle J. Brown

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On April 1, the Florida Supreme Court — in a 4-3 vote — cleared the way for the public to decide an abortion-rights ballot that would amend the Florida Constitution to protect access to abortions in November. But in a 6-1 separate ruling, justices allowed for a 6-week abortion ban across Florida starting May 1. That timetable further endangers women of childbearing age in disastrous ways.

Florida has been a critical access point for women seeking abortions, but no more. With the upcoming more restrictive ban, the state will become part of the solid swathe of the South, an abortion desert of states hostile to women’s sovereignty over their bodies.

These are the women enduring precarious talks of having to sit in their vehicles in parking lots waiting for indications that they are close to death before doctors can save their lives. Others have been sent home by their doctors unable by law to aid their patients and children, teenagers and women who have been raped and have been forced to have babies they don’t want. Meanwhile, those who are able, can try to travel to states where they can get an abortion.

In an anguished story last year, Lakeland mother Deborah Dorbert was unable to get an abortion in Florida. The baby had no kidneys.

“Her doctors told her it was too late to terminate the pregnancy in Florida, which (currently) bans nearly all abortions after 15 weeks. The only options were to go out of state to get an abortion or to carry the baby to full term, and Dorbert and her husband didn’t have the money to travel,” according to a CNN report. “What followed was an agonizing 13 weeks of carrying a baby she knew would die and worrying about her own health.” Her son Milo died March 3, 2023.

Elsewhere, in Ohio in 2022, a 10-year-old girl, who was raped and became pregnant, had to travel to Indiana to get an abortion because Ohio’s draconian anti-abortion law has no exception for incest or rape.

Protests in response to Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization ruling at the U.S. Supreme Court, June 24, 2022. (Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images)

Yet, even as Gov. Ron DeSantis, his anti-abortion allies and the Republican supermajority legislature celebrate this victory on the 6-week ban, they should be very worried because as William Shakespeare reminds us, “past is prologue.”

Since the U.S. Supreme Court tossed away almost 50 years of precedent by overturning the landmark Roe v. Wade, when it comes to abortions and reproductive justice, Republicans can find no safe political harbor.

For reasons many can’t fathom, far-right, socially conservative Republicans and most of their allies assumed that in the aftermath of the contentious and divisive ruling, it would be smooth sailing.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

Their confidence has cracked

Republicans are facing a reckoning, one of their own making.

They are flailing about, putting on a brave face, pretending to be cool as they’ve watched as voters in several states – from the Bluest blue to the deepest Red — reject Republican lawmakers’ attempts to impose their will on those they purportedly serve.

For as long as Roe was the law of the land, social conservatives, evangelicals and others schemed, devised and clamored for the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse it.

They got their wish when Donald Trump became president and he and then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell followed through on their Machiavellian plan to ignore then-President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court pick and pack the high court with three conservatives they knew would eviscerate Roe v. Wade.

Despite the absolute seriousness of reproductive justice, the GOP reaction has been interesting to watch. Their confidence has cracked. And their arrogance, duplicity and cruelty has been replaced by panic and raw fear creeping down their backs as they have lost election after election since July of 2022.

According to an NBC story written in 2023, “abortion has been on the ballot in seven states since that landmark court decision one year ago and in each instance, in red states and blue states, anti-abortion advocates have lost.” Americans have made it clear that they want to preserve or restore the protections Roe offered. Even Fox News polls show widespread support for abortion access.

Pro-choice advocates, buoyed by their victories, have been relentless in their pursuit of justice.

The Women’s March leads a crowd around the Arizona state Capitol in Phoenix, Arizona on Jan. 20, 2024. Photo by Gloria Rebecca Gomez | Arizona Mirror

In addition to Florida’s ballot initiative in November, the Arizona Mirror reported on April 2 that “the effort to guarantee abortion access in Arizona has now surpassed the number of signatures it needs to qualify for the ballot.” And the “campaign announced on Tuesday that it has so far gathered more than 500,000 signatures.”

Several more states are pursuing ballot initiatives or proposals that may be considered in November, according to Axios.

In the aftermath of Florida’s bombshell rulings, President Joe Biden declared that Florida will be in play in November’s presidential election. Other political pundits concur, saying that the issue has energized and motivated women and men of all ages, classes and political persuasions.

Deeply unpopular anti-abortion laws

Republicans have failed the women in this country. This tyrannical minority is drunk with power and control.

Yet rather than pulling back, acknowledging that they mucked up and changing direction, this confederacy of dunces have doubled down on their cruelty, and are locked into their dismissiveness of female voices and continue to find ways to pump their poisonous toxins into America’s veins.

DeSantis and his buddies must surely be aware that between 60% to 70% of Americans oppose their efforts to implement deeply unpopular anti-abortion laws but they continue to power forward, seemingly unconcerned about the repulsive and reprehensible policies they champion.

Republican politicians and policymakers thought that they were safe in their deeply gerrymandered districts and judges believed they were sheltered from any consequences for their rulings. But no one is safe.

While GOP politicians are ducking and dodging this stormy and pungent issue, DeSantis and now-former president Trump have no choice but own it all because their fingerprints are all over everything. The governor and his advisors very cynically figured when he was running for president they could bolster his arch-conservative cred and box in Trump.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signs the six-week abortion ban into law late at night on April 13, 2023. Credit: Governor’s office

As has become customary, DeSantis signed the 6-week ban in the dead of night.

Trump has tried to dance around the issue, but it is so demanding, potent and divisive, he has been forced to offer his policy position, such as it is. He settled on a 15-week ban which pleased and offended his allies in equal measure. Recently, the ex-president promised a national abortion ban, which the Biden campaign highlights in a new ad.

Trump, inexplicably, continues to run his mouth, proudly telling anyone within earshot he’s the reason why Roe v. Wade was overturned. I’m pretty sure that most Republicans wish he would shut his mouth but being guarded and restrained has never been his strong suit.

I’m no pundit but I predict that his party will pay and pay dearly in November, given the anti-abortion crews’ dismal record on reproductive healthcare, and all the Democratic wins in the midterms, primaries and special elections.

The confederacy of dunces will have no one else to blame but themselves if they get their butts handed to them. Pundits more dialed in than I argue that the only way to force Republicans to change is if they lose early and often.

May Republicans therefore be beaten at the polls, frequently and brutally, until someone in the party — other than Trump and the far-right dimwits — steer what’s left of the Republican Party towards governing commonsense and humanity.

And if that doesn’t work, they’ll have no choice but to break the entity all the way to its foundation and rebuild it brick-by-brick.

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