Critics Call Florida Bills on Ballot Initiatives an Anti-Democratic Attack on Abortion Rights

A million dollars. That would be the new price tag of democracy in Florida if bills targeting citizen initiatives become law — one that abortion rights advocates say are designed to keep reproductive rights off of future ballots. 

Florida lawmakers are advancing legislation that critics say would effectively kill citizens’ ability to change the state constitution through ballot initiatives. House Bill 1205 and two Senate proposals would overhaul the petition process, making grassroots efforts nearly impossible, especially those on abortion. 

The bills come in the wake of November’s defeat of abortion rights and marijuana legalization amendments. Gov. Ron DeSantis publicly opposed both measures and accused the committee behind the abortion amendment of collecting fraudulent petitions. 

“It’s just anti-democratic at this point,” said Shannon Emmett, senior policy analyst at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research. “The proposed changes are very clearly an attempt to stymie efforts that have been made to advance the constitutional right to abortion in Florida, which, as we know, a majority of voters already confirmed they support.”

The bills would require petition sponsors to post a $1 million bond after gathering just 25% of the required signatures, mandate that all petition collectors be Florida residents and U.S. citizens, and require voters to include identification numbers on petitions. They would also shorten the deadline for submitting signed petitions from 30 days to 10 days and increase fines for violations up to $50,000. 

The ID requirements in the bills are especially troubling to Emmett.

“We know that women who legally change their name often don’t have an ID that reflects their legal name change… similarly, folks who relocate often, their addresses don’t match,” she said. 

While HB 1205 has already cleared the House on April 3, two Senate bills with more restrictive language are still moving through committees. SB 1414, introduced by Republican Sen. Blaise Ingoglia on March 10, would remove volunteer petition gathering altogether.. 

“If third party groups are restricted from participating in the signature collection, then the citizen-led petition process itself becomes virtually impossible,” said Emmett. “Local grassroots organizations often don’t have the resources or the staff to support direct outreach, door-to-door signature collection that’s needed to move these initiatives forward.”

“It’s a time-intensive effort that demands a lot of human power,” she continued. 

SB 1414 would also increase criminal penalties for petition sponsors and allow petitions to be challenged at every stage of the process, instead of when it reaches the Supreme Court. 

A second Senate bill, SB 7016, introduced on March 5, would change the legal review process at the Supreme Court level, potentially killing amendments before signature gathering begins. 

Republican Rep. Jenna Persons-Mulicka from Fort Myers, who sponsored HB 1205, argues that the citizen initiative petition process is “broken” and has been “taken over by out-of-state fraudsters looking to make a quick buck.”

“We must ensure we have integrity in that process,” she said during the bill’s last House committee stop on March 26. 

Critics see this as a direct attack on abortion rights. 

“I think that this proposed change is fear-based,” Emmett said. “Anti-abortion lawmakers are seeing that their anti-abortion agenda is not popular among voters, that it’s in direct opposition to what Floridians want.”

David Cohen, a law professor at Drexel University who has represented abortion clinics for 25 years, agrees. 

“It’s quite obvious that [DeSantis] just wants to make it harder for the people to express their democratic voices,” he said. 

Cohen noted that in November, “a real solid majority of Floridians… voted for abortion rights, but because you have the antidemocratic 60% requirement, it failed, even though a majority – a very strong majority – wanted this.”

Florida is among just 12 states that require a 60% approval threshold to pass constitutional amendments. The state previously had a 50% threshold until a 2006 amendment increased it. 

Cohen described the current abortion landscape in the U.S. as “very fragmented,” with 12 states banning abortion completely and seven others banning it in early pregnancy. 

“One in four people who can get pregnant have an abortion in their lifetime, it’s incredibly safe,” said Cohen. “It’s a very common part of healthcare, even though it’s obviously highly politicized.”

In Florida specifically, abortion is banned after six weeks of pregnancy, with limited exceptions.

“By the time most people find out they’re pregnant, it’s about four or five weeks based on pregnancy math. So that means you have one or two weeks to make a decision and execute that decision,” Cohen said. 

Bill Calvin, Florida regional coordinator for the Center for Bio-Ethical Reform, backs the proposed legislation, calling it a “healthier” approach due to fraud concerns. 

Calvin, who has been involved in anti-abortion activism for over 50 years, said he believes abortion is comparable to the Holocaust, lynchings and other forms of mass murder. 

“My 16-year-old granddaughter is more developed than my 8-year-old granddaughter, but that doesn’t give anybody the right to kill an 8-year old,” he said. 

Calvin believes that “there’s no reason to kill another human being” and that “human rights should begin when you’re a human. You’re a human from the first cell.”

His organization uses graphic imagery of aborted fetuses in public displays at Florida colleges – including a recent exhibit at Florida Atlantic University – in attempt to change pro-choice voters’ minds about abortion. 

“Nobody likes to look at pictures of victims of injustice, but we found that that’s the way to educate people about it,” Calvin said. 

Notably, Calvin said that during their last visit to FAU’s Boca Raton campus on Feb. 10, the organization’s volunteers recorded that 131 of 445 pro-choice students they spoke with became “more pro-life than they were before.”

Currently, only 26 states provide citizens with the power of initiative or referendum. 

“The entire process is intended to be an opportunity for voters to exercise their voice, especially when they feel like their elected representatives aren’t acting in a way that represents their views,” Emmett said. “I think it's dangerous to our democracy. I think it's going to exclude important voices.”