Amid Supreme Court bombshell, providing abortions in Florida is already a challenge
When the owner of an abortion clinic in Broward County was asked Wednesday how the past few days have gone at her clinic, she told the Miami Herald it has been “like a madhouse.”
But the owner — who asked that she and her clinic remain anonymous due to safety concerns — was not referring to Monday’s leak of a Supreme Court draft opinion that indicated Roe v. Wade could be overturned, wiping out nearly 50 years of federal abortion protections.
Instead, she was talking about a Florida judge’s ruling last month, after a seven-year legal battle, that let stand legislation requiring women to wait 24 hours after an initial doctor visit before they can get an abortion.
The change is just one example, the owner said, of how providing abortions in Florida has “gotten more and more difficult as those that are above me send down all these new laws.”
“They just make everything twice as difficult as it has to be,” she said. “I resent that tremendously.”
Representatives of several abortion clinics in South Florida told the Herald on Wednesday that it has been business as usual since the Supreme Court leak on Monday. But they said they were already facing major legal and other challenges in their work.
Some said anti-abortion protesters regularly gather near their doors, pressuring patients not to go inside.
READ MORE: What to know about Florida’s abortion law as Supreme Court looks to end Roe v. Wade
In 2020, Florida lawmakers passed a bill requiring consent from a parent or guardian in most cases of minors seeking abortions. Clinics are now also preparing for the implementation of a new law, signed last month by Gov. Ron DeSantis, that bans most abortions after 15 weeks of pregnancy and goes into effect July 1.
“That’s going to significantly impact the way we have been able to help patients,” said Alexa Lane, a reproductive rights advocate and counselor at Presidential Women’s Center in Palm Beach County.
Fetal anomalies are often detected after 15 weeks, Lane said. Some of their patients travel from states such as Texas, Alabama and Louisiana and as far away as the Caribbean and South America, she added.
“These patients are already going through a very difficult time. It is just cruel,” she said.
Laura Goodhue, a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood in Florida, said the 15-weeks law will disproportionately affect “the most vulnerable,” namely those “who have a hard time accessing care or if something has gone terribly wrong.”
She said multiple organizations, including Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union, are preparing to challenge the state’s 15-weeks law in court, though a lawsuit has not yet been filed.
Even so, Goodhue said, Florida remains a relative haven amid a wave of state-level abortion restrictions across the country. Planned Parenthood clinics in Florida have recently seen patients from as far away as Texas and Oklahoma, she said, two states that recently banned most abortions after about six weeks of pregnancy.
“Florida has a history of not upholding abortion restrictions because of our stronger right to privacy,” Goodhue said. “We’ve been preparing, so we will be here for our patients no matter what.”
If the Supreme Court does strike down Roe v. Wade, it’s not yet clear how it might affect abortion laws in Florida. DeSantis has so far been quiet on the matter.
But abortion providers and activists are bracing for the worst. The Broward Women’s Emergency Fund, a nonprofit that helps cover medical costs for people who get abortions at one of three clinics in Broward County, has received over $1,400 in donations this week — well beyond the few hundred dollars it typically raises in a month, said board director Ingrid Ayala.
“It is great to see that people are making these additional donations and clearly making it a priority,” Ayala said. “We don’t know exactly when and how this Supreme Court decision will play out, but we’re going to keep doing the work that we do.”
This story was originally published May 4, 2022 at 6:59 PM.
