The future of abortion in Florida could be decided by voters

The Importance of a Pro-Abortion Amendment to the Voting Rights of Reproductive Rights in the State of Ohio, and Its Implications to a November Voting Measure

The measure’s import may not be immediately clear to voters, but it’s meant to thwart a November ballot initiative that will decide whether reproductive rights should be constitutionally protected in Ohio, where a sweeping abortion ban is tied up in court. Frank LaRose is the Ohio Republican Secretary of State and he has denied that Issue 1 is related to abortion. He told a group of supporters in May that it was 100 percent about keeping a pro- abortion amendment out of the constitution.

Issue 1, which Ohio Republican legislators put on the ballot, would make future ballot measures to change the state Constitution harder to pass in two key ways. If the proposal is approved, citizens will have to collect signatures from each of the state’s 88 counties and submit them to the voters. And to pass, constitutional ballot initiatives would need to win 60 percent of the vote, rather than a simple majority.

In the past, justices have held that a privacy clause in the state constitution protects access to abortion until viability. The justices are expected to uphold Florida’s 15-week ban in the September challenge, because they are more conservative now than when the ruling was made in 1989.

“If I have breath in my body, I’m going to continue to fight for freedom and liberation,” says Brown, who heads Power Up People.

Brown is outside Florida’s historic Capitol with other advocates hoping to raise awareness about the movement for a constitutional amendment protecting access to abortion.

The Floridians Protect Freedom Campaign: Organizing a Campaign to Get the Amendment on the Vote to Protect Abortion in Florida

Volunteers are packing up and heading to a local church because the weather has been pretty bad most of the day.

Brown says that they would stay and get soaked if it were up to her. She says it has never diminished her determination, despite the weather postponing their plans for a rally.

There is a fight happening all over Florida. In Orlando, after an on-stage call out from Hayley Williams, lead singer of the band Paramore, 1,300 people signed onto the effort. In Clearwater, a woman brought petitions to her choir practice, and in Naples a woman sought support from her book club.

The campaign director of the group that is leading the effort to get the amendment on the ballot says the volunteer component is going to garner hundreds of thousands of petitions.

“And they understand the gravity of that and it’s speaking to the same thing we’ve seen nationwide, which is when you give decisions around abortion to the voters, they don’t want politicians involved in those decisions.”

There’s a movement that isn’t all grassroots. More than a dozen advocacy organizations, including the American Civil Liberties Union, are helping Floridians Protect Freedom.

More national support is expected once the measure passes a state Supreme Court ballot language review. Then, it would take support from 60% of the voters who turn out in November of 2024 to change the state constitution.

She says, “It is clear that when a question about abortion was on the ballot, Floridians voted to make private healthcare decisions without governmental intrusion.”

A poll conducted by the University of North Florida’s Public Opinion Research Lab in the weeks leading up to the recent legislative session shows 75% of voters either oppose or support the state’s six-week abortion ban.

If Florida’s six-week ban goes into effect, people coming from places like Texas, Louisiana, Georgia and Alabama will have to travel farther to access care. It also means many Florida patients will have to travel to states with lesser restrictions.

Data from the Florida Agency for Healthcare Administration shows so far this year, 3,390 out-of-state residents received abortions in Florida out of 38,244 abortions reported.

He imagined Floridians casting their votes in the booth with a decision to make: “Abortion access or constitutional recognition of the right to life for the pre born.”

Minck, who was adopted, said that he has not stopped trying to protect “unborn life” since he started working on this initiative. It’s something he thinks belongs in the state constitution.

Minck says he has a lot in common with the people fighting to protect abortion access: Both sides want to amend the state constitution, both want help from voters to get their movements passed and both are responding to “discontentment with the Florida Legislature.”

He’s still popular with people who would support his campaign. In a way, Minck says, he hopes both measures make it to the ballot, so people can have a healthy debate and voters can have a choice.