A Florida House panel passed a bill on Tuesday that would require minors seeking an abortion to obtain consent from their parents first.
Florida law currently requires parental notification but not consent.
According to Florida Politics, the House Health & Human Services Committee voted favorably on HB 265, which requires physicians to obtain notarized written consent of a parent or legal guardian before performing an abortion on a minor.
It does, however, provide some exceptions to consent. If a court finds any evidence of child abuse or sexual abuse, parental consent is no longer necessary.
The House is set to vote on the bill in January.
If this bill passes in both the House and Senate, it wouldn’t be the first time Florida required parental consent. In 2003, the Florida Supreme Court struck down a similar law that went back to the 1980s.
Rep. Erin Grall, R-Vero Beach, who sponsored the bill, says parents have a right to have a say in their children’s abortions.
“I find it just overwhelmingly tragic that a parent would not have the ability to know whether or not the facility by which their minor daughter goes to obtain an abortion was in fact safe, was in fact reputable, was clean, that the provider themselves had the best interest in the medical outcome of the girl,” she says, according to the Tampa Bay Times. {eoa}
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