By Jo Jo P. for the Women’s Commission of the American Party of Labor–

With abortion rights under attack in the Sunshine State, organizations like SWAN have answered the call to arms in protecting access to healthcare. Despite their successes, the battle is far from over – an amendment on the November ballot to protect abortion access in Florida means SWAN will need continued support. The Red Phoenix interviewed Winnie Swan, a representative of the organization.

Stand With Abortion Now (SWAN) is a class-conscious organization based in Central Florida dedicated to defending abortion clinics and their patients. As an entirely volunteer-run organization, funding to continue their work can be limited. The invaluable services SWAN is able to provide, such as clinic escorting and connecting patients with abortion care resources, are unfortunately dependent on the whims of fascist state legislators and subject to targeting from the most reactionary segments of the Florida population.

In 2015, the state of Florida passed a law forcing abortion clinics to require a 24-hour waiting period before providing abortions. For seven years, the implementation of the law was held up in court pending disputes over its constitutionality. However, on the evening of Friday, April 8, 2022, Leon County circuit judge Angela Dempsey issued a ruling enforcing the law effective immediately, rejecting any time allowance for plaintiffs to file appeals or for the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration (AHCA), which regulates these laws, to notify abortion clinics of the change. Overnight, abortion clinics across Florida scrambled for guidance on how to properly implement the law, and many of them reached out to AHCA directly but their requests for clarification largely fell on deaf ears. Within weeks, 14 abortion clinics across the state were penalized with fines totaling $728,000, the heftiest of which was a $193,000 fine levied against the Women’s Center in Orlando.

The Women’s Center is a historically Black and women-owned independent abortion clinic. Such clinics are few and far between in the US, and especially in the South. All abortion clinics have to deal with increasing scrutiny in today’s political climate, but the number of constant reports for relatively minor infractions had become exhausting for the nurses, some of whom have worked at the clinic for decades and many of whom had uploaded their resumes to Indeed, anticipating losing the jobs and working relationships they had been so dedicated to for so long. The AHCA and other oversight bodies have been very critical of staff and doctors hired by the clinic. According to Winnie Swan, “It seems like our clinic can do no right and it definitely feels like it’s discriminatory.”

SWAN had a non-profit sponsor, but at that point was raising funds for abortions on an individual, case-by-case basis and had never raised more than $1,000. On the day the Women’s Center was fined, the SWAN team held a meeting and the conversation quickly turned to whether they could raise the funds themselves. Perhaps it was SWAN’s ethos of revolutionary optimism, perhaps it was sheer delusion, or a combination of the two, but the group quickly set to work. The SWANs are an all-volunteer, working-class group. They worked during their lunch breaks at their full time jobs to call the media. Winnie Swan reported running on about 10 hours of sleep that first week. The group’s non-profit sponsor worked out the legalities, and on the first day, SWAN had raised almost $50,000. That weekend, they raised an additional $40,000 during a live video stream on social media. Once the group had reached their halfway point toward the goal, the donations came flowing in and that’s when they realized what had at first seemed like a pipe dream: they really could save this clinic. 

SWAN’s success didn’t come without some critique. The Women’s Center was operating independently, that is to say, without National Network of Abortion Fund (NNAF) backing. The NNAF is an organization that works with smaller state organizations to assist with funds for abortion procedures. Long before SWAN became involved, the Center had an incident involving a doctor whose medical license was ultimately revoked. Even after ownership of the clinic changed, and the former doctor was no longer affiliated whatsoever, its reputation was tarnished and NNAF continues to refuse to support them. 

In addition to institutional obstacles, there were political critiques as well. Winnie Swan recalls how disheartening it was for SWAN to see many progressive liberals and self-proclaimed “leftists” using revolutionary jargon without any apparent intention of working towards revolutionary goals. Many of these progressives were sharing their criticisms online from major cities that already had abundant access to care, such as New York with over 100 abortion clinics within city limits, and thought that patients in Orlando could simply visit another clinic. However, the Women’s Center is one of only two abortion providers in Orlando and, as the only independent abortion clinic in the city, is by far the busiest.

SWAN experienced another setback later that year when their TikTok account was shut down in the middle of a fundraising live stream. Winnie Swan believes the account was targeted by anti-abortion users who submitted simultaneous reports en masse in order to flag the account for termination. According to Winnie Swan, TikTok had closed the account down multiple times in the past, each time giving only vague reasons for the shutdown, claiming content of an “inappropriate nature.” Previously, the platform would offer a half-hearted apology and restore the account, but this time it was shut down permanently and all content was erased. SWAN had prepared for such an event and had created a backup account, but it has yet to receive as much traction as the original. Lack of access to their audience on TikTok has significantly impacted, but not halted, SWAN’s outreach and fundraising capabilities.

After the success of the Orlando Women’s Center fundraiser, three more Florida abortion clinics reached out to SWAN for help: The East Cypress Women’s Center in Oakland Park (near Ft. Lauderdale), A Woman’s Choice in Miami Lakes, and A Woman’s Care in North Miami Beach. Before their original TikTok account was terminated, SWAN had raised an additional $220,000 in funding. However, that money had already been spent on other assistance before these three clinics reached out.

Without the outreach capabilities of their TikTok following, SWAN calculated that in order to save these clinics they would have to completely deplete their remaining $40,000 in operational funds, leaving them with $0 going forward, not even any money to pay for a P.O. box. This could spell the end of the organization altogether.

As a grassroots, class-conscious organization, SWAN held a forum and a vote among their members on how to proceed. “This is a real working class organization,” Winnie Swan recalls. “There’s a lot of us that don’t even make $40,000 a year, so to talk about giving it away like that was really hard.” Ultimately, within a day, SWAN decided that to stay true to its mission and values, they would use all of the remaining funds to support the abortion clinics, with 90% of the organization voting in favor. Fortunately, these three clinics had had a little more time to raise some of their own funds than the Orlando Women’s Clinic. They had already begun making payments towards their own fines and SWAN was able to cover the rest owed. As luck would have it, a week later, two of SWAN’s TikTok videos suddenly went viral. They received $10,000 in donations from the exposure almost immediately and the group was back in business.

Right now in Florida, Amendment 4 (2024), The Amendment to Limit Government Interference in Abortion, is headed to the November ballot. This proposed amendment to the Florida Constitution states, “No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider.” SWAN has been closely following the progress of this initiative since its approval last May.

The passage of this law would be monumental for abortion rights in Florida. With abortion rights enshrined in a constitutional amendment, Gov. Ron DeSantis and his cronies would have no power to limit abortion access through executive action. However, if the amendment does not pass, this would trigger a 6-week abortion ban set in place by the DeSantis administration.

The stakes are incredibly high, and whether this amendment passes or not, SWAN will continue to need all the support they can get to assist Floridians with abortion access. “If the law does pass, it’ll be expensive because there’ll be a large influx of patients from out of state who will need assistance for longer term abortions,” said Winnie Swan. “If it does not pass, it will be expensive because we’ll need to get patients to other states [to receive care].” Either way, SWAN is prepared to build their platform and ready their volunteers. 

To learn more about SWAN, and to donate or volunteer, visit their website at swanoforlando.org. You can also follow them on TikTok and Instagram for regular updates and to show your support!

Categories: Health Care, U.S. News, Women