Florida Supreme Court to Consider 15-Week Abortion Ban

The Florida Supreme Court agreed this week to take up a lawsuit filed by several pro-abortion organizations challenging the state's 15-week abortion ban and denied a motion to temporarily block the law while the case continues. The ban on abortion after 15 weeks gestation was passed by the legislature during last year's regular session and signed into law by Gov. DeSantis in April 2022. The new law provides exceptions for saving the life of the mother, avoiding an irreversible and substantial impairment of a major bodily function of the mother, and fatal fetal abnormalities.

In 1989, in In re T.W., the right to privacy in Florida’s constitution was misinterpreted by the Florida Supreme Court to protect a woman’s right to obtain an abortion. This new case, Planned Parenthood of Southwest and Central Florida, et al. v. State of Florida, will prompt the court to revisit that decision. We are hopeful that the current Court will determine that the privacy clause in our state constitution does not prohibit the legislature from restricting abortion procedures before viability. 

Giving time for briefs to be filed by both sides, oral arguments in the case are expected to occur no earlier than late April.