Orlando - Friday May 20, 2022: Gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist Friday vowed to issue an executive order protecting a women's right to abortion if he wins the election.
The recent leak of a draft decision from the Supreme Court threatens to overturn the high court's 1973 decision in Roe vs. Wade which affirmed a woman's un-restricted right to choose to have an abortion during the first trimester of her pregnancy.
If Roe is over-turned, it would be up to individual states to set the rules for abortions, or ban them all together. Just last month, Governor DeSantis signed into law a measure, similar to other states that would prohibiting all abortions after 15 weeks.
At a news conference in Orlando Friday Florida Congressman Charlie Crist said if elected Governor he would change that. "I will sign an executive order on day one that will be clear in protecting and fighting for a woman's right to choose," he declared. "It will direct all agencies under the Governor's authority to not interrupt any woman's right to choose and make her own decisions about her body and her own health care."
Crist was critical of Governor DeSantis who he accused of ignoring important issues while focusing on the culture war. "I'm running for Governor so that the people of Florida have a people's Governor again because right now we don't," he said. "Our current Governor fights culture wars all day long, every single day, and doesn't care about our housing crisis, doesn't care about the insurance crisis."
Crist was joined by Democratic State Representative Anna Eskamani who said that her republican colleagues in the Florida Legislature are now planning legislation to ban all abortions. "If we don't have a governor to be the veto pen, and if we don't secure enough votes to prevent an over-ride of such veto, she said, "we will see an all-out abortion ban in Florida. Governor Ron DeSantis has made that clear. They're already asking him to expand this upcoming Special Session to ban abortion."
Crist will face two opponents in the August Florida Democratic Primary Election, both of whom have also taken strong stands in support of a woman's right to choose, and both of them are women, Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried and state Sen. Annette Taddeo.###