Florida appeals court strikes down law letting minors get an abortion without parents' consent
A three-judge panel of the Fifth District Court of Appeal found that the state's judicial waiver law violates parents' Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process, citing the state's parental rights laws, a recent ruling by the Florida Supreme Court and the landmark 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision that stripped away federal abortion rights.
'Whatever asserted constitutional abortion rights may have justified Florida's judicial-waiver regime in the past unequivocally have been repudiated by both the U.S. Supreme Court and the Florida Supreme Court,' reads the appeals court opinion penned by Judge Jordan Pratt and joined by Judges John MacIver and Brian Lambert.
For years, anti-abortion activists and Republican state lawmakers have worked to unravel minors' rights to petition a judge to access the procedure in Florida, which bans most abortions after six weeks, before many women even know they are pregnant.
The appeals panel flagged the case as 'a question of great public importance' for the Florida Supreme Court, which ruled in 2024 that a privacy clause in the Florida Constitution does not guarantee a right to an abortion.
The three-judge panel sided with arguments made by state Attorney General James Uthmeier and ruled against a 17-year-old girl who is nearly six weeks pregnant and seeking an abortion without the knowledge or consent of her father.
The appeals court affirmed a lower court ruling that the girl, who is only identified as Jane Doe, lacks the 'requisite maturity' to make the decision without a parent or legal guardian involved.
The opinion said the decision was based on her lack of 'emotional development and stability, her credibility and demeanor as a witness, her ability to accept responsibility, and her ability to assess the immediate and long-range consequences of her choices."
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California legislature poised to vote on redistricting plan in response to Texas gerrymandering
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This would almost certainly be met by legal action – Dana Nessel, Michigan's attorney general, has already filed a lawsuit arguing the 'arbitrary and illegal order' to extend JH Campbell's lifespan will unfairly heap costs upon households in the state. Trump's efforts may bear some fruit, with US coal production expected to tick up slightly this year, although the longer-term trend for coal is one of decline amid cheaper gas and renewables. 'The administration may slow the retirement trend although they are unlikely to stop it,' said ClearView's Fox. 'The economics don't change but the administration could be a savior for these plants at least while Donald Trump is in office.' For those living next to and downwind of coal plants, there is a cost to be paid that isn't just monetary. Tiny soot particles from burned coal can bury themselves deep into the lungs, causing potentially deadly respiratory and heart problems. The closure of such plants can lift this burden dramatically – a recent study found that in the month after a coal facility was closed near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 2016, the number of childhood asthma visits to local hospitals declined by 41% and then continued to fall by about 4% each month. The study shows 'the closure of a major industrial pollution source can lead to immediate and lasting improvements in the lung health of the those who live nearby', said Wuyue Yu, research co-author and postdoctoral fellow at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine. For those living in the township of Port Sheldon, a mostly bucolic setting on the shore of the vast Lake Michigan, a pollution-free future beckoned once JH Campbell had been scheduled to close, with lofty plans for new parkland, housing and a battery plant touted for the site. Now there is uncertainty. 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'The talk in neighborhoods has been how hot it's been this summer – my kid was prepared to be outside every day and it's been so hot so often it's been irresponsible to do that,' said Stephen Wooden, a Democratic state lawmaker who added that Michigan residents are also 'pissed off' about increasing power bills. 'We're seeing the impacts of climate change daily, it is impacting our state,' Wooden said. 'And this is being caused by the continuation of outdated, expensive fossil fuels that Donald Trump wants to prop up.'
