Bill to let Florida parents sue over an unborn child’s wrongful death appears stalled

A Florida bill that would let parents receive financial damages for the wrongful death of unborn children appears stalled in the Legislature with about two weeks left before the end of the legislative session.

Abortion rights supporters had raised concerns that the bill could erode abortion access by giving fetuses more rights.

The legislation also came under added scrutiny after the Alabama Supreme Court decided that frozen embryos qualified as children under that state’s wrongful death act — a decision that caused at least three fertility clinics to pause treatments.

Sen. Erin Grall, R-Vero Beach, requested that the bill, SB 476, be postponed on Monday from the Senate Rules committee meeting.

“Although I have worked diligently to respond to questions and concerns, I understand there is still work that needs to be done,” Grall said in an emailed statement. “It is important we get the policy right with an issue of this significance.”

When asked later about the fate of her bill, she responded: “There are two weeks of session left and I don’t have a crystal ball.”

There are no more Rules meetings scheduled before the end of the session, according to Senate spokesperson Katie Betta, which means the bill appears finished.

Grall, in her statement, said she believes this was the first time the Legislature looked at the issue of civil liability for the death of an unborn child. When she presented the bill, she stressed that it was not about abortion, but about recognizing the value of a child’s life and the hurt of a family that loses a pregnancy due to negligence.

The majority of U.S. states allow for some civil remedy for the wrongful death of an unborn child, but 25 of those states permit it only if the pregnancy was viable, meaning the child would have been able to survive outside the mother’s womb with medical help, according to a House bill analysis. Viability is generally estimated to begin at about 24 weeks.

Grall’s bill allowed people to receive damages for wrongful death regardless of the age of the fetus.

Even before Alabama’s ruling, Grall had amended the bill to address fears that the bill could stymie access to infertility treatments, clarifying the definition of an unborn child to: “member of the species Homo sapiens, at any stage of development, who is carried in the womb.”

Senate Democratic Leader Lauren Book said the language did appear to protect in vitro fertilization. But she raised other concerns, saying the bill was a “back door attempt” to establishing “fetal personhood,” which aims to give fetuses rights beginning at conception.

After the bill was postponed, Book expressed gratitude on social media, saying, “Thankfully, it appears personhood will not be the law of the land in our state.”

Mary Ziegler, an expert on reproductive law at the University of California, Davis, said that if courts decide a fetus has “personhood,” the thinking is that homicide laws would apply as well — making abortion impermissible.

Before postponing the bill on Monday, Grall on Friday filed an amendment that would prevent a wrongful death action from being brought over a lawful abortion. At least one anti-abortion group opposed the amendment.

The matching House legislation, HB 651, is ready for a full floor vote, but it has not been scheduled yet.

This story was originally published February 26, 2024 at 5:41 PM.