Photo by Matt Keller Lehman
Marchers on Orlando’s Church Street during the January 2023 rally marking the 50-year anniversary of Roe v. Wade.
A grass-roots group of abortion rights activists have met and surpassed their fundraising goal to help save a local abortion clinic fined by state health regulators over a restrictive state abortion law.
Early Sunday evening, Stand With Abortion Now’s crowdfunding campaign fund, benefiting the Center of Orlando for Women, rose from $191,000 to over $196,000 within the period of an hour, surpassing their goal of $193,000.
“This community and beyond has rallied behind our little organization and the clinic we serve, and we actually raised enough money to pay off the fines that DeSantis’s AHCA thought would shut us down,” the group wrote on an Instagram post celebrating the milestone. “This was a TREMENDOUS FEAT and every single person who donated, all 5.5k of you, share in this success. EVERYONE stepped up to say #NOMORECLOSEDCLINICS.”
WE ARE SO OVERWHELMED AND THANKFUL. WE CANNOT BELIEVE IT. Y’ALL REALLY SHOWED UP FOR US AND FOR OUR CLINIC.
Thank you all so much, from the bottom of our feathered hearts. 💖🫶🦢🥺
We can’t wait to tell Anne. #nomoreclosedclinics #swanofcentralfl pic.twitter.com/U4N6aETcvl
— SWAN Clinic Escorts (@SWANofCentralFL) August 28, 2023
As Orlando Weekly previously reported, the Center of Orlando for Women — one of just two abortion clinics in the city — was fined $193,000 for 193 alleged violations of a state law that requires a 24-hour waiting period before an initial consultation with an abortion provider and the abortion procedure. The controversial law was initially passed in 2015 but blocked by the courts until 2022.
State health regulators with the Agency for Health Care Administration earlier this month hit the clinic with a $193,000 fine over alleged violations that occurred between April 25 and May 9 of last year. The clinic’s attorney has cried foul over the fine, arguing that clinic staff were unable to get information about when the law would go into effect, and ended up implementing the new policy themselves without receiving guidance from the state.
The clinic’s attorney, Julie Gallagher argued for a smaller fine, sharing that a $193,000 fine would likely bankrupt the private clinic, which sees high traffic from patients in Florida and those traveling for abortion care from neighboring states with more restrictive abortion policies.
“We were very diligent in trying to find out the effective date of the change,” Gallagher previously told Orlando Weekly. “This is a really unfair situation.”
Other abortion clinics in Florida have also been fined over the law, but none have been hit with a fine so high.
Concerned about the implications such a fine could have on the clinic’s ability to remain open as well as abortion access in the Orlando area, Stand With Abortion Now stepped up to crowdfund the money the clinic would need, raising $197,000 in less than two weeks from 5,500 contributions.
Stand With Abortion Now, or SWAN, is a group of volunteer clinic escorts based in Orlando that formed in the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision, overturning the federal constitutional right to abortion. Volunteers with the group stand guard outside of the Center of Orlando for Women, formerly known as the Orlando Women’s Center, to protect patients from the harassment of anti-abortion protestors, who visit the clinic daily, emboldened by the support of a doctor next door.
According to SWAN, the average donation to the crowdfunding campaign was $35. Some donors left comments as they contributed, ranging from messages that were resolute (“Abortion is healthcare”) to the silly (“Tell RON [DeSantis] to KISS MY GRITS”) and somber.
“I’m from Australia and I am continuously in a state of shock at the disregard and hateful actions targeting women’s rights in the US,” one donor wrote. “I recognise more than ever the privilege I hold as a woman in my country when I see disgusting reducing measures like this that directly harm women. I hope and I pray for change that allows women the right to choose without it ever being a question of possibility or access.”
Another donor wrote, “This is for my daughter. She deserves the right to make her own decisions about her life and her body. No old, decaying, out of touch/never knew anyway man will make her decisions for her.”
Abortion in Florida is currently legal up to 15 weeks of pregnancy. A six-week limit was signed into law by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis this spring, but that limit is contingent upon the outcome of a lawsuit over the 15-week limit. That case is set to go before the Florida Supreme Court next month.
At the same time, a multimillion-dollar campaign has also been launched to get abortion rights on the statewide ballot next year, to raise the limit to fetal viability, or about 24 weeks of pregnancy.
On Sunday night, members of SWAN celebrated reaching their goal for the abortion clinic fundraiser outside of Orlando Weekly’s unofficial Best of Orlando party at Will’s Pub, in Orlando’s Mills 50 district.
Democratic State Rep. Anna Eskamani, a strong abortion rights advocate who also stopped by to pick up her Best of Orlando awards, congratulated SWAN on their achievement. “Orlando will continue to fight back and protect abortion access for all!” Eskamani wrote in a social media post.
CONGRATULATIONS @SWANofCentralFL FOR REACHING THEIR GOAL IN RAISING $193K+ TO SAVE OUR LOCAL ABORTION CLINIC IN ORLANDO!! Grateful to everyone who donated! Orlando will continue to fight back and protect abortion access for all! pic.twitter.com/36cnwPVpj3
— Rep. Anna V. Eskamani 🔨 (@AnnaForFlorida) August 27, 2023
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