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Women may soon have to wait at least 24 hours after consulting a doctor to have an abortion. The day long  wait was approved by the full house today after, as Mike Vasilinda tells us, impassioned debate and warnings of problems with the courts.

For more than an hour the debate raged. Making women wait a day was either “Disrespectful and offensive to women” said State Rep. Cynthia Stafford of Miami.

Or it’s fair. “No other elective, significant surgical procedure is ever done on the same day as the initial consultation” said Cary Pigman of Sebring. Pigman is a medical doctor.

The legislation makes an exception for women who have been raped, or are victims of domestic abuse or human trafficking…but they have to show documentation. That angered retired police officer Victor Torres. “Do you think she’s going to have documentation. She’s going to run to the police and report it because its a family member? No” said Torres.

Others, like Janet Cruz (D-Tampa) called the wait a de-facto ban, because it would make women drive as much as a two hundred miles round trip on two different days to get to a clinic. “Do you think a woman who has to work and pay the bills has the ability to take two days to travel 400 miles for a procedure?’

At 23, Sponsor Jennifer Sullivan is the youngest member of the House.

“It has been said on many occasions that I am anti woman, and that I don’t trust women. And so for one last final time, I’d like to say that is not a fact.”

Nat sot of passing  77yeas, 41 nays Mr Speaker

While the debate was mostly along party lines, four Republicans did vote no, and one Democrat did vote yes.

Heather Fitzenhagen of Ft. Myers was one of  four GOP members to vote no.

“I think its unwanted government intrusion” said Fitzenhagen.

Opponents warn the waiting period will run afoul of a strong constitutional right of privacy thats in Florida’s constitution.

Florida has one of the strongest rights to privacy written into the state constitution, and 63 percent of the voters in 2012 rejected attempts to weaken that right when it came to abortions.