Abortion rights campaign challenges financial impact statement’s validity

Abortion rights protesters. Image via AP.

The group backing ballot language to limit restrictions on abortion is having its say in court over a controversial financial impact statement that will be printed on the November ballot under Amendment 4.

“The question before this Court is simple,” the abortion rights campaign argued in a court filing as it challenges the statement, which warns about publicly funded abortions and litigation costs.

“Does the Financial Impact Estimating Conference (FIEC) have the authority to perform a second analysis of a proposed constitutional amendment and adopt a new financial impact statement on the order of the Senate President and House Speaker? The answer is unequivocally no.”

Floridians Protecting Freedom, the group supporting Amendment 4, is asking the Florida Supreme Court to nullify the financial impact statement approved last month by a state panel.

In an unusual move, a representative from Gov. Ron DeSantis and a Heritage Foundation staffer joined the FIEC to approve the statement that addresses the uncertainty of Amendment 4 allowing Medicaid-funded abortions and the amendment potentially invalidating abortion laws on parent consent for minors’ abortions, as well as the possibility for legal costs to the state.

The statement also says, “An increase in abortions may negatively affect the growth of state and local revenues over time. Because the fiscal impact of increased abortions on state and local revenues and costs cannot be estimated with precision, the total impact of the proposed amendment is indeterminate.”

Amendment 4 supporters called the financial impact statement inaccurate and a dirty trick to mislead voters and defeat the amendment, which needs at least 60% of the vote to pass to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution.

The FIEC analyzed Amendment 4’s financial impact statement last year and said there would be cost savings if Amendment 4 was passed. The FIEC reconvened last month to meet again and craft a new statement after the state’s six-week abortion ban went into effect in May.

Attorney General Ashley Moody argued the FIEC “was well within its authority” to create a new financial impact statement and the 150-word statement was “a model of clarity” in her court filing last week.

But Wednesday, Amendment 4’s response argued, “Contrary to the State’s position, there is no legal basis for a Conference to adopt a ‘complete rewrite based on a new analysis’ or take multiple ‘crack(s)’ at analyzing an amendment.”