Vice President Kamala Harris visited the Prime Osborn Convention Center in Jacksonville to decry Florida's abortion laws that outlaw the procedure six weeks after conception on Wednesday, May 1, 2024. | Will Brown, Jacksonville Today
Published on May 1, 2024 at 6:18 pm
The first vice president in the history of the United States who could ever become pregnant visited Jacksonville on Wednesday afternoon to decry Florida’s latest abortion law.
Vice President Kamala Harris used her 14-minute speech to vehemently oppose the Heartbeat Protection Act that Gov. Ron DeSantis signed in April 2023. The Florida Supreme Court upheld the law, and it took effect Wednesday.
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“As of this morning, 4 million women in this state woke up with fewer reproductive freedoms than they had last night,” Harris told a crowd of a few hundred people inside the Prime Osborn Convention Center.
The 11-page bill was co-introduced by Republican state Sen. Clay Yarborough of Jacksonville.
It prohibits physicians from performing or inducing an abortion “after the gestational age of the fetus is determined to be more than six weeks.”
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There are exceptions if a woman is a victim of rape, incest or human trafficking. It also allows for abortion if there is a medical need that would save a woman’s life or help “avert a serious risk of imminent substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman other than a psychological condition.”
The law also outlaws the use of telehealth to induce abortion or the use of medications that are mailed directly to pregnant women.
State Rep. Dean Black, R-Jacksonville, says the law will restore the resiliency of families. Black, who also serves as chairman of the Duval GOP, described the law as compassionate to mothers and righteous.
“There will always be someone who will say ‘But, what about those who didn’t know they were pregnant?’ There are people who give birth who didn’t know they were pregnant,” Black told Jacksonville Today. “So whatever date we picked would be subject to that argument. We chose the six-week time frame because we were trying to protect life. And, it’s hard to argue that life doesn’t exist when there’s a detectable heartbeat.”
Unlike Black, his colleague Sen. Tracie Davis, D-Jacksonville, has experienced the difficulties of pregnancy.
Shortly after she married in 2011, Davis realized she was pregnant. After finding out she had an ectopic pregnancy — where a fertilized egg grows outside the uterus — Davis decided to terminate her pregnancy.
It’s a decision she says was between her, her husband and her doctor.
Wednesday, Davis reminded the crowd there is no reason that she, or any other woman who elects to have an abortion, should be ashamed.
Bernadette Williams faced a similar decision in 1973.
Williams was 17 years old and enrolled at Florida Community College at Jacksonville when she found out she was pregnant. Though the right to an abortion had been guaranteed earlier that year with Roe v. Wade, she did not elect to terminate her pregnancy.
She faced hospitalization and life-threatening complications, and she had a miscarriage.
Decades later, Williams said that she personally would not have an abortion but that women should have the choice to decide for themselves.
“My thing is, if you have made up in your mind that you don’t want to have children, there is birth control,” Williams told Jacksonville Today this week. “There are other preventative ways besides abortion. There is not having sex. There is protection. There are things you can do.”
Williams said her faith leads her to believe that a terminated pregnancy is akin to murder outside the womb. Nevertheless, she said she sympathizes with the decisions that women must make.
The overwhelming theme Wednesday was that the decision to birth a child should be made by the mother and not by governmental policy.
Harris laid the blame squarely with former President Donald Trump.
“So, Florida, the contrast in this election could not be more clear,” she said. “Basically, under Donald Trump, it would be fair game for women to be monitored and punished by the government, whereas Joe Biden and I have a different view. We believe government should never come between a woman and her doctor.”
Dr. Shelly Tien a gynecologist who has served as an abortion provider in Jacksonville and throughout Florida, introduced Harris. Afterward, Tien told Jacksonville Today she hopes more people realize over the next seven months that abortion is a health care issue.
“It’s a fundamental human right that has been taken from 51% of the population,” Tien said. “I believe this impacts women, children and families.”
Ansley Anderson might agree that a decision to terminate a pregnancy affects families. The similarities end there.
Anderson is a native Jaxson who believes life begins at conception. She is a member of the University of North Florida chapter of Students for Life of America. Anderson calls Florida’s Heartbeat Protection Act a solid start, but she would like to see all abortion made illegal here and throughout the country.
“If we can get it to six weeks, people understand that there is life in there and they can hear the heartbeat,” Anderson said. “And, most women, when they hear that heartbeat, they realize there is life within them.”
Anderson, 21, will vote in an election for the first time this fall. She is steadfastly opposed to Amendment 4, which would protect abortion rights in Florida until a fetus is viable.
“I’m voting no. I’m walking with women and children. I’m also walking with fathers who are greatly affected by what this amendment could do,” Anderson said. “And, by voting no, I’m supporting life.”
Students for Life of America sent members to demonstrate in front of the Planned Parenthood location in the San Jose community Wednesday morning.
Inside the Prime Osborn, the crowd was heavily Democratic and energized at the presence of the first Black vice president in American history.
Outside the convention center, demonstrators included other Students for Life members as well as the Jacksonville Community Action Committee. The former protested Harris’ position on abortion. The latter was incensed by what they consider the Biden administration’s tolerance of Israel’s killing of Palestinians in Gaza, a response to Hamas attacks in October.
“We are here to demand a ceasefire in Gaza,” said Sara Mahmoud, an organizer with the Jacksonville Palestinian Solidarity Network “We are still here to show out and make sure that it is clear that the grassroots community in Jacksonville does not support Kamala Harris, and that we believe the Biden-Harris administration, in order to win back our vote, needs to change course on Gaza and it needs to happen now.”
Biden won Duval County with 51% of the vote in 2020. It marked the first time since 1976 that Duval County supported a Democrat in a presidential election.
Kruzshander Scott hopes for a repeat. The executive director of the Jacksonville Chapter of Negro Women says that can only happen with voter turnout.
While Black women have long served as the backbone of the Democratic electorate, the Black voter turnout in Duval County has been below the countywide average in the most recent mayoral, gubernatorial and presidential elections.
Scott said she plans to highlight student loan reimbursement, the fate of the Duval County School Board, affordable housing and abortion access in her pitch to encourage voters to cast a ballot in August’s primary and November’s general election.
The summary of the November abortion amendment states: “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider. This amendment does not change the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.”
Jacksonville resident Elinor Grabar says it’s imperative that young people vote this fall. Grabar stood in the front row, next to her mother, sporting a T-shirt that championed Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision that allowed for abortion access.
“This November, up and down the ballot, reproductive freedom is on the ballot,” Harris said. “And, you, the leaders; you, the people, have the power to protect it with your vote.”
Jacksonville Today reporter Dan Scanlan contributed to this report.
