Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis has signed law one of arguably the most horrific, dystopian fascist decrees in the country right now, and understand that no matter who the GOP candidate for the White House in 2024 is, they will run on bringing this fascism to every corner of America.
On Thursday, DeSantis announced that he signed the Heartbeat Protection Act into law, which will now require a woman to provide proof that the pregnancy was a result of rape, incest or human trafficking in order to receive an abortion up until 15 weeks of gestation.
Documentation can include a restraining order, police report, medical record or other evidence.
This restriction is an exception to the new law, which states that otherwise, abortions will be banned after six weeks unless done to save a pregnant person's life.
Read that again. Go on, I'll wait.
You have to have documented proof of your rape, or you have to bear the rapist's child. The burden of proof is on the victim.
"We are proud to support life and family in the state of Florida," DeSantis, 44, said in a news release.
"I applaud the Legislature for passing the Heartbeat Protection Act that expands pro-life protections and provides additional resources for young mothers and families," he added.
The legislation comes exactly one year after the Florida governor signed a bill prohibiting abortions after 15 weeks. That law is currently being challenged before the Florida State Supreme Court. The new law would only go into effect if the previous 15-week law is upheld.
On Thursday, The White House issued its own rebuttal to the news that the bill had passed in Florida.
"This ban would prevent four million Florida women of reproductive age from accessing abortion care after six weeks — before many women even know they're pregnant," White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement issued Thursday.
The statement added, "This ban would also impact the nearly 15 million women of reproductive age who live in abortion-banning states throughout the South, many of whom have previously relied on travel to Florida as an option to access care."
Florida’s Senate Bill 1718 is much worse than even Arizona’s notorious SB 1070 in 2010, which turned every police officer in that state into an immigration agent. The wide-ranging assault would make it a felony for anyone to give someone they know or should “reasonably” know to be an undocumented immigrant a ride, a job or shelter, punishable by up to five years in prison — and up to 15 years if the immigrant is a minor.
In addition, the bill would ban out-of-state tuition waivers at colleges and universities for undocumented students; invalidate out-of-state licenses given to undocumented immigrants, such as those issued by California; prevent undocumented immigrants from becoming attorneys; require hospitals to collect data about the immigration status of patients and the costs they incur; and require that the Florida Department of Law Enforcement cooperate with federal immigration enforcement. The bill would also make it a felony for someone to use false identification to obtain a job and punish employers who don’t use the federal E-verify program to check immigrants’ documents.
Such changes would have a chilling effect on immigrant communities in Florida and turn good Samaritans or even family members into criminals. Clergy members who minister to undocumented immigrants would be forced to choose between helping those in need and their concern about potential criminal penalties. People who employ undocumented gardeners, nannies or housekeepers would have to fire them or face criminal charges.
Immigrants and immigrant advocacy organizations worry that the bill is so vague it could apply to mixed-status households, meaning U.S.-born children couldn’t give their undocumented parents a ride or allow them to stay overnight. And with a Republican supermajority in both houses of the Florida Legislature, the bill is likely to pass.
DeSantis said the crackdown is necessary “to protect” Florida residents from what he claims are President Biden’s open-border policies. That’s ridiculous. Of the 4.5 million immigrants in Florida, slightly more than 900,000 are undocumented. And they pay taxes — about $1.6 billion a year, according to the American Immigration Council.
Furthermore, the border is not open, and certainly not friendly to immigrants. Biden has continued and expanded the Trump-era policies of expelling migrants to Mexico or deporting them to their home countries, partly due to court challenges and pressure from Republicans.
Florida legislators eager to climb aboard the DeSantis hate train may laud him as a bold visionary, but this tired political ploy is just as likely to come back to bite them. That’s what happened more than a quarter-century ago after California Gov. Pete Wilson and the state Republican Party supported the rabidly anti-immigrant Proposition 187, which would have barred undocumented immigrants from receiving healthcare, public education and other services. The measure was declared unconstitutional and solidified Democratic control in the state.
I'm hoping that the courts find both to be unconstitutional and that these laws cost DeSantis his political career. I'm probably wrong on the latter part, but if these stay as laws in Florida, thousands of regular people are going to go to prison for a very long time for helping women and undocumented immigrants, and it's going to make both categories of living, breathing human beings into subhuman pariahs.
Ron DeSantis is an absolute fucking monster, and I no longer hesitate to use that exact term to describe him.
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