Five other Southern states – Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Tennessee and Kentucky – have total bans. Florida's law now puts it on par with two nearby Southern neighbors – Georgia and South Carolina, which also have six-week bans. Exceptions to the bans vary by state.
Criticism of the Sunshine State's ban is "absurd," Mike Beltran, a Republican representative in the Florida legislature, said on Washington Watch Wednesday. "For a long time, Florida had the most lenient abortion laws in the entire South and only now have we finally closed that gap and we're in line with South Carolina and Georgia. And we're still more lenient than much of the rest of the deep South and the Midsouth and parts of the Midwest."
Lynda Bell, of Florida Right to Life, praises the new bill. "This will protect babies that when women are pregnant they can have an abortion up through six weeks with exceptions," she tells AFN. "And there are exceptions for rape, incest, life of the mother, medical emergency and I believe also human trafficking."
Bell says another positive aspect of the bill is that it provides $25 million for women and children in need, women who are pregnant and need financial assistance.
"So, we've not only protected life but we have put our money where our mouth is in helping women," she emphasizes. "You would think that this would make the Left a little bit happy that we're actually going to provide services to women and children – because some of them are minor girls in need – but no. [There has been] silence … dead silence."
Bell argues Florida is doing the right thing by sparing most innocent babies in the womb from death but standing firm with women so they carry their baby to term and life outside the womb.
Biden searches for political points
President Joe Biden has characterized the law as "extreme" and hopes voters will respond by carrying him to victory in a state that Gov. Ron DeSantis has helped turn solidly red.
In a recent campaign speech in Tampa, Biden pointed to pro-abortion victories in Ohio and Kentucky since the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. "This November you can add Florida to that list," he said.
The law could see some changes in the not-too-distant future. Florida voters, as a result of a ballot initiative, will consider abortion rights in November.
Biden blamed Donald Trump for Florida's law. "This extreme Florida law is going to impact 4 million women in the state. Let's be real clear. There's one person responsible for this nightmare, and he's acknowledged, and he brags about it – Donald Trump," Biden said.
Beltran argued that Biden's campaign stumping is out of touch with reality.
"Florida is well in line with the rest of the region of the country of which we're a part, and our abortion law that we passed, first of all, we delayed the implementation to await guidance from our state Supreme Court. I didn't think we had to do that, but we did that," he told show host Tony Perkins.
The legislation also includes exemptions for the mother's health, for pregnancy resulting from rape, from incest and for a diagnosis of lethal fetal anomaly.
"We have a whole bunch of exceptions, [and it] should gratify the opponents of the bill that we had so many exceptions," Beltran added. "I don't think we're extreme at all. I think we're right there where the Florida voters are and where a lot of Americans are and where virtually every other state in our region is until you get to North Carolina or Virginia."
The Guttmacher Institute, a pro-abortion nonprofit research group, found that before Florida's new law took effect, one out of every three abortions in the South was performed in Florida.
Beltran contended that what's happening with abortion around the nation is what the Supreme Court intended. "They said they're returning the issue to the states – and lo and behold, Florida passed additional abortion restrictions," he said.
"And I'll add this: when we did a 15-week bill a couple of years ago, it sort of coincided with Dobbs. As we put in more restrictions and took it down to 15 weeks from 24 weeks, the number of abortions in Florida actually increased because at the same time, Dobbs was issued and the rest of the South had either passed their own laws or they had their trigger laws take place.
"So, we passed an abortion bill to restrict abortion, and abortion went up in Florida because more people were coming from the rest of the South to Florida. We went from the most lenient state to still being the most lenient state by passing a 15-week bill. So, the idea that Florida is some sort of an outlier, I think, is absurd," Beltran said.
Abortion tourism is not what Florida does
Still, Beltran expects Florida's new six-week law may irk some out-of-state folks.
"I think that folks in the rest of the South and maybe people in the North are aggrieved that it's going to be a little bit harder to practice abortion tourism, and I make no apology for that," he concluded. "We have beaches, and we have parks. We have good weather. Abortion is not part of what we're marketing for tourism to the rest of the country."
