Florida women will no longer have the right to abort from 15 weeks of pregnancy according to the law promulgated Thursday by the Republican governor of this southwestern state of the United States. The text, adopted by the Florida Parliament with a Republican majority, which will come into force on July 1, reduces the legal threshold for abortion from 24 to 15 weeks of pregnancy. The only exceptions taken into account by this new law are those of a “serious risk” for the health of the woman or a lethal anomaly of the fetus, but not in the event of rape or incest.
“We are here today to stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves,” Ron DeSantis said as he signed the text at a rally of anti-abortion activists. “This represents the greatest life protection measure enacted in this state in a generation,” he added.
“An attack on our freedoms”
“This ban on abortion is an attack on our most fundamental freedoms: the right to dispose of our body, of our own future”, denounced in a press release Stephanie Fraim, president for the south-west and the center of the Florida from the Planned Parenthood organization which runs many abortion clinics across the United States.
The Florida law is comparable to a text from Mississippi, the legality of which is under review by the United States Supreme Court. The highest court in the country, profoundly overhauled by Donald Trump, must render its decision before the end of June. During the examination of the file, its conservative judges, now ultra-majority (six out of nine) let it be understood that they could take advantage of this file to reduce or even cancel the right to abortion. Recognized in the landmark case “Roe v. Wade” of 1973, this right is valid today as long as the fetus is not viable, that is towards the end of the second trimester.
Very restrictive laws in several states
Galvanized by the conservative majority of the Court, several Republican states have recently adopted very restrictive laws on abortion. Texas has gone the furthest by prohibiting the termination of any pregnancy as soon as the embryo’s heartbeat is perceptible, approximately four weeks after fertilization.
Florida, like Arizona or West Virginia, preferred to follow a middle path. Their bet? If the Court simply reduces the legal threshold for abortion, their laws may remain in force.