What a shame the Florida Democratic Party has been on life-support for a couple of decades. If it was more than active is just a few urban strongholds— and just barely— it could exploit a double gift the Florida Supreme Court just handed it yesterday— an outrageously medieval month and a half abortion ban plus the right for voters to add an amendment— Amendment 4— protecting abortion to the state constitution, something the state GOP fought against with all its might. (As a bonus— at least to Democrats— the Supremes also allowed ballot access for a recreational marijuana amendment as well… also opposed by the state’s GOP.)
The two amendments are expected to attract the kinds of voters who tend to back Democrats but might not have come out to vote because of no plausible down ballot candidates and because, like most Americans, they don’t want to vote for either Trump or Biden. The DSCC and state party is behind a total dud for Senate, Debbie Musarsel-Powell and Alan Grayson hasn’t been seeing any love from the mainstream media. So… another (tragic) wasted opportunity for Florida Dems. A trio of Washington Post reporters wrote that the ban at 6nweeks plus the constitutional amendment “will ensure that abortion is a major issue in Florida during the presidential election— with Floridians experiencing the realities of a six-week abortion ban for six months before they have the opportunity to cast a vote on the issue. ‘Today’s rulings prove exactly what is at stake at the ballot box,’ said Nikki Fried, the chair of the Florida Democratic Party. ‘Florida voters understand that voting yes on Amendment 4 in November is our last line of defense.’… [S]urveys show that most of the state’s voters oppose bans on abortion during the very early stages of pregnancy.”
The proposed amendment states: “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” A 60 percent supermajority would need to vote in favor of the amendment to add it to the constitution.
Florida’s current 15-week ban has already compelled many patients, including those with life-threatening pregnancy complications, to seek abortion care elsewhere. A six-week ban in Florida will affect tens of thousands more people, forcing many to drive hundreds of miles to undergo the procedure.
The six-week ban emerged as an issue in DeSantis’s bid for the Republican presidential nomination. Antiabortion activists have praised the law, but Trump, the GOP’s presumptive nominee, has called the six-week ban “terrible.” Some Republicans, pointing to recent electoral defeats for antiabortion causes, have warned of a political backlash in the general election against strict bans.
The ruling reflects a major shift for the Florida Supreme Court, which has struck down several abortion restrictions over the past few decades. It has recently been reshaped by DeSantis into what many consider one of the most conservative courts in the country. Several judges who ruled to uphold the abortion ban have roots in the antiabortion movement.
One of those justices, Charles Canady, is a former Republican congressman who sponsored legislation to outlaw abortions later in pregnancy. His wife, state Rep. Jennifer Canady (R), co-sponsored the six-week abortion ban.
Even if voters decide to add abortion protections to the constitution in November, the battle for abortion rights in Florida could be far from over, said Mary Ziegler, a law professor at the University of California at Davis who specializes in abortion.
In the ruling on the amendment, Ziegler noted, the justices emphasized that any new constitutional protections for abortion could conflict with “personhood rights as applied to the unborn child.”
That language signals that the state Supreme Court could still intervene to restrict abortion rights, no matter what happens in November, she said.
“This is shots fired, for sure,” she said. They could not have been any clearer that this is not the end of this ... They’re saying the constitution may still protect the fetus and unborn child, and that question is still alive.”
Don’t be surprised if Trump bad-mouths the ban as part of his war against DeSantis… and because he’s savvy enough to know how massively unpopular a 6 week ban is. [He reluctantly endorsed it today, pushed to do so by his campaign staff.] There’s no doubt Biden will force a response from Trump. Yesterday Biden’s campaign released a memo about how the decisions have made their path to a Florida victory a lot more feasible. “As we’ve seen in election after election, protecting abortion rights is mobilizing a diverse and growing segment of voters to help buoy Democrats up and down the ballot. With an abortion amendment officially on the ballot this November in Florida, President Biden and Vice President Harris and their commitment to fighting back against Donald Trump and Rick Scott’s attacks on reproductive freedom will help mobilize and expand the electorate in the state, given the overwhelming majority of Floridians support abortion rights. And Florida Republicans will be forced to defend their cruel, indefensible support of this abortion ban… Florida Republicans’ toxic political agenda isn’t just taking away rights; it’s leading to higher costs for Florida working families.”
Alan Grayson, the progressive Senate candidate, told us this afternoon that “There is, in fact, a liberal-libertarian majority in Florida in favor of abortion rights, the right to smoke marijuana, a higher minimum wage, voting rights, etc. This has been established over and over again, and this is where Floridians are at. What holds us back more than anything, at this point, is that there are approximately four million Democrats who aren’t registered to vote, including one million who have been dropped from the voter rolls since COVID started. If every adult American citizen in Florida were registered, this state would be around as ‘blue’ as New Mexico, regardless of who or what is on the ballot.”
If the Florida Democratic Party had a pulse— had Debbie Wasserman Schultz never destroyed it— not only would it win back a dozen seats in the state legislature, it would have candidates who could beat these six MAGA incumbents (PVIs and Trump margins are listed):
Maria Salazar (FL-27)- even PVI (Trump +0.3)
Laurel Lee (FL-15)- R+4 (Trump +3.2)
Carlos Giménez (FL-28)- R+2 (Trump +6.3)
Cory Mills (FL-07)- R+5 (Trump +5.5)
Aaron Bean (FL-04)- R+6 (Trump +6.7)
Anna Paulina Luna (FL-13)- R+6 (Trump +6.8)