Florida Judges Are Back To Deny Teen An Abortion But This Reason's A Doozy
One (1) good spot in this week's reproductive rights roundup. Read on!
The big news in abortion this week is, of course, the fact that a federal appeals court found that Texas is entirely within its rights to let women die rather than letting them have an abortion and that the Emergency Medical Treatment and Labor Act (EMTALA) does not apply to states that outlaw abortion.
This is probably very exciting news for male Texans who spend a lot of time talking with their therapists about their base fear that their own mothers did not love them enough to give up their own lives so that they could live. It is bad news for literally anyone who can get pregnant in the state.
But wait — that’s not all that happened!
Florida Is Galling, As Usual
On Wednesday, a Florida appeals court rejected an attempt by a minor to obtain an abortion without parental notification or approval, the second incident within the span of a month.
The minor, referred to as Jane Doe, tried the appeals court after failing to get approval from Leon County Circuit Judge Lance Neff — but the First District Court of Appeal dismissed the case, determining that they did not have legal jurisdiction to decide it … because her parents weren’t there.
“This appeal comes to us with only the minor’s interests presented to the court,” said the ruling, which was written by Judge Lori Rowe and joined by Judge Thomas Winokur and Judge Brad Thomas. “And without representation of the interests of the parents — the parties whose rights are directly implicated under the parental notification and consent law. Indeed, the appeal comes to us with no appellee (a respondent in an appellate case) at all. Under these circumstances, there is no justiciable controversy for us to adjudicate.”
Take that in for a moment and just let it wash over you. The only way for a minor to get an abortion in the state of Florida without parental permission or notification — the very point of this being that they do not want their parents to know they are having an abortion — is to go to court. That is what the law says. But the court says they can’t rule on it, because her parents are not there. The parents that are not supposed to know about the abortion.
If that wasn’t bad enough, Judge Brad Thomas issued a separate concurring opinion in which he suggested that by allowing this girl to have an abortion, they would be depriving her parents of some kind of beautiful parent-child moment. Never mind that, in many cases, that beautiful moment would involve the kid getting kicked out of their homes or worse.
“Without notice and without an opportunity to be heard, the minor’s parents are deprived of the most fundamental liberty interest recognized in law: the fundamental right to care for and raise their daughter, to advise and counsel her regarding this decision,” Thomas wrote.
It’s an abortion, not a fucking Father-Daughter dance. It’s her uterus and her life. They don’t need to be heard, there is no reason for them to be heard, and they don’t need to “advise and counsel” her if that is not something that she wants. It is not their business if she doesn’t want it to be. She is the one who will have to deal with a child or the knowledge that she has a child out there for the rest of her life, not them.
Oh! By the way, if you want to know why the court denied the other girl her petition to have an abortion? It was because she “failed to demonstrate sufficient maturity” to make that choice for herself. Because sure, why not let someone who “failed to demonstrate sufficient maturity” manage a pregnancy and then, potentially, raise a child. What could possibly go wrong?
Our Maine Squeeze
Maine, a state that is frequently confusing even to other New Englanders, did a really good thing! Because as of the beginning of this year, abortion patients with private insurance will no longer have to pay a copay for an abortion or be required to meet a deductible. Nice!
Via PBS:
Lisa Margulies, VP of Public Affairs for Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, says cost can be a huge barrier to access for many women who need abortion care in a timely fashion.
"Few people have the savings to afford a medical emergency," she says, "and these costs can be catastrophic. Those costs could mean a month's rent, day care for their children, a car payment and then push them closer to poverty."
Margulies says the average deductible for an employer-sponsored health plan can be $2,600 or more, and the cost of an abortion ranges from $500 to $1,500.
Now, sure — this is one of those “This is nice but also kind of depressing when you think of it,” because of the whole "Few people have the savings to afford a medical emergency" of it all and the fact that we have to pay so much for medical emergencies, unlike normal countries with universal healthcare, but it’s still a whole lot nicer than the alternative.
Good job, Maine!
Arkansas Put Abortion On The Ballot … But There’s A But
I have always hated it when people say that the outcome of a successful negotiation is that no one goes home entirely happy. Because you know what? Sometimes only one party deserves to go home unhappy.
But this is the gist of the abortion-related initiative one group is hoping to get on the ballot in Arkansas. Arkansans for Limited Government (AFLG), a less-than-promising-sounding group, has put forth a ballot initiative that would allow abortion up until 18 weeks. This is better than the current state of affairs in the state, where abortion is now entirely illegal, but it is also entirely arbitrary and of little help to those seeking abortion for medical reasons.
Via Slate:
Gennie Diaz, the group’s executive director, said the organization jumped into action after it saw internal polling that showed 51 percent of Arkansas supported a limited right to abortion. Diaz said the poll, which she could not share publicly, showed that “61 percent of Arkansans either think that abortion should be legal in some circumstances, or that’s just none of the government’s business.”
Diaz said the nonprofit chose to advocate for abortions up to 18 weeks instead of until viability because it wanted to speak to those 51 to 61 percent of Arkansans. And that particular gestation marker of 18 weeks, which she said was a “reasonable, sensible cutoff,” had polling support, whereas people didn’t know what viability meant. “When you get to a specific week, people go, ‘I know what that means.’ [They] can say ‘yeah, that’s appropriate up until this point in time,’ ” Diaz said. “After that [they say], ‘Hmm, I don’t feel good about that.’”
Yes. The actual argument here is “we are doing it this way because people in this state are too stupid to know what viability means” — and while it’s possible that this is true of a lot of people in a lot of states, it also allows the government to continue banning abortion after a certain point. Given that less restrictive initiatives have passed in every state where they have been on the ballot, including in some very conservative states, it seems worth trying that at first, at least, and then moving onto “Okay, how about 18 weeks, even though that will still make things difficult for those with complicated pregnancies?”
Diaz said, “It’s threading the needle with Arkansas voters on what they view as limited government.” She said: “It’s not meant to be a parlor trick,” but rather an invitation for people who consider themselves pro-life to support the measure so it can pass. “Honestly, it’s not palatable to either end of the spectrum, and that’s intentional,” she said.
Yeah, I’m gonna say that a lot of people who “consider themselves pro-life” were not so “pro-life” once they actually got in the voting booth. Also, this is a logical fallacy.
And Some Other Stuff!
Allie Phillips, a Tennessee woman who had to go to New York City in order to get an abortion when it turned out that the child she wanted, Miley Rose, suffered from a condition that could prove fatal to both of them, only to find out that the fetus’s heart had stopped beating by the time she got there … is now running for office. [ABC News]
New research has shown that women are stockpiling abortion pills out of fear that they may not be able to get them in the near future. [CNN]
And they’re really smart to do so, because the push to ban them is being funded by dark money groups associated with conservative activist Leonard Leo. [The 19th]
>> Allie Phillips, a Tennessee woman who had to go to New York City in order to get an abortion when it turned out that the child she wanted, Miley Rose, suffered from a condition that could prove fatal to both of them, only to find out that the fetus’s heart had stopped beating by the time she got there … is now running for office. <<
Vileaxxe is going to be all over this. Go Allie! Go Vile! Go Tennessee!
Ah, Republican America, where a girl is not old enough to read what she wants in a public library and must be shielded from all adult content or sex education until she is 18 bc she is a sweet young minor...but she's apparently old enough to be a mother and raise a child against her will. I love the not so veiled subtext in all these rulings which is....girls and women should be *punished* with motherhood for their whoreish ways, even when it's rape. Misogyny always and forever.