Stephanie Madden pushes Lakeland City Commission into a useful forced birth discussion

Madden's questions reveal a commission unwilling or afraid to ask basic public questions that could save a woman's life. Her colloquy makes clear the referendum is the *only* option to protect women.

I was pleasantly surprised by what happened Monday at the Lakeland City Commission after I read my five minute statement calling for the Commission to:

• Convene a maternal public health summit with Lakeland Regional Health officials.

• Publicly demand that LRH publish comprehensive lists of 1) life-threatening conditions pregnancy LRH and other doctors are allowed to treat and 2) fatal fetal anomalies, like Potter Syndrome, that allow a pregnant woman to end her pregnancy.

You can read my statement here if you want. You don’t need to watch me read it.

You should, however, watch this video of what happened when I finished. I expected stony silence from the entire City Commission. But thanks to Commissioner Stephanie Madden, who has said publicly she supports 6-week government forced birth, we got a very clarifying few minutes of discussion from the City Commission. Key takeaways from me on the other side:

1. Stephanie Madden is, by far, the strongest public leader on the City Commission. She is least afraid to publicly grapple with the merits of any situation and/or take heat for that grappling. I’ve watched her demonstrate this on multiple issues other than forced birth. I obviously think she’s wrong on 6-week forced birth — but she is doing here what any person serious about supporting 6-week forced birth is morally obligated to do. Contrast her leadership here with that of Mayor Bill Mutz, who has long been one of the most prominent public forced birth advocates in Lakeland/Polk County. You can see Bill just wants to get this whole episode over with. But there is no end to it, Bill …

2. It appears to be the quasi-official opinion of the Lakeland city attorney and a critical mass of silent and/or passive city commissioners that endless lawsuits about individual life-threatening conditions and individual fatal fetal anomalies are the only acceptable path to forced birth exception clarity. That is madness when you think about it at all. Watch for yourself: Madden asks me who should be in charge of clarifying the state 6-week forced birth law; Mayor Mutz intercepts the question and directs it to City Attorney Palmer Davis, who then answers: “It would be the court system, not a local government.” Rather than simply ask publicly the state government or LRH to provide comprehensive exception lists, every individual act of suffering has to be litigated after the suffering or death. That literally seems to be the city government position. It will take decades. That is brutal madness.

3. I was pleasantly surprised by how validating the overall discussion was. By that, I mean no commissioner questioned my facts, or point-of-view, or even my repeated accurate use of “forced birth” to describe the issue at hand. Commissioner Mike Musick validated my points through the experience of his wife, a longtime pregnancy delivery nurse.

4. Despite the validation, the commissioners (Madden excluded) seemed to seek refuge in a powerlessness that does not exist. Yeah this is bad; but what can we do? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ was the general sentiment. As I said to them: “I think you would be surprised by what power you have just by the virtue of the positions you hold to drive clarity. I think the ‘bully pulpit’ is one of the core powers of being an elected official.” Indeed, the City Commission routinely complains about state and federal laws and/or advocates for change on everything from homelessness to insurance costs to affordable housing to transit. Forced birth is no different.

5. I suspect — and I’m happy to be proven wrong — that what truly vexes commissioners is the prospect of upsetting or embarrassing or isolating Jennifer Canady and Ron DeSantis — who dishonestly jammed this law down the City Commission’s throat as surely as they did LRH’s and the public’s. Given a clear choice between saving pregnant women from death/suffering and getting on the wrong side of Jennifer Canady and Ron DeSantis in public, I’ll let you decide where commissioners will fall.

6. All of that makes it clear that neither the state nor local governments nor local hospitals will take any responsibility for addressing the carnage of these forced birth laws — now politically orphaned — that so many folks claimed were moral imperatives just months ago. That’s why the referendum to overturn six week forced birth is polling at 61 percent — with no real resistance from the carcass of the pro-life “movement.”

   So if you’re on the fence about the referendum, just watch the Lakeland City Commission tell you clearly that voting yes is the only way to protect pregnant women from the feckless, brutal inertia of the dead pro-life movement. Trust me, commissioners, with the possible exception of Stephanie Madden, will be relieved when you do.

   Give them what they clearly want. Make this go away.