Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration violated the First Amendment by threatening to prosecute broadcasters if they didn’t stop airing a political ad supporting an abortion rights ballot initiative, the measure’s sponsor alleged in a lawsuit filed Wednesday.
Floridians Protecting Freedom sued the state in federal court, the latest legal salvo over the contentious Amendment 4 measure on the Nov. 5 ballot that would repeal the state’s six-week abortion ban.
“The state of Florida’s crusade against Amendment 4 is unconstitutional government interference — full stop,” Lauren Brenzel, Yes on 4 campaign director, said in a prepared statement. “The state cannot coerce television stations into removing political speech from the airwaves in an attempt to keep their abortion ban in place.”
Florida Department of Health’s General Counsel John Wilson sent a cease-and-desist letter to local TV stations on Oct. 3 demanding they remove the ads within 24 hours or the department would seek criminal charges for spreading lies about Florida’s six-week abortion ban.
It was one of a series of controversial steps the DeSantis administration has taken against Amendment 4, raising questions about the ethical and legal lines between governmental authority and political campaigning.
At least one station — WINK-TV in Fort Myers — stopped airing the ad after receiving the letter, according to the lawsuit.
Wilson and Florida Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo, the head of the Department of Health, are listed as defendants in the suit. Wilson is no longer with the agency, the Miami Herald reported.
Health department officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In the 30-second ad, a Tampa Bay woman named Caroline Williams recounts the traumatic experience of discovering she had terminal brain cancer when she was 20 weeks pregnant and needing an abortion to receive life-extending treatment. “The doctors knew if I did not end my pregnancy, I would lose my baby, I would lose my life, and my daughter would lose her mom. Florida has now banned abortion even in cases like mine,” she says.
Health officials called the ad false and wrote in the letter that it could threaten the health of women by leading some to believe they were ineligible for medical treatment. Florida’s abortion ban includes exceptions to save a pregnant woman’s life or “avert a serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman other than a psychological condition.”
The First Amendment “does not include free rein to disseminate false advertisements which, if believed, would likely have a detrimental effect on the lives and health of pregnant women in Florida,” Wilson wrote.
The ad constituted a “sanitary nuisance” punishable through “criminal proceedings,” he wrote in the letter to television stations in Tampa, Gainesville, Sarasota, Panama City and other markets.
Amendment 4 supporters said in their lawsuit that a Florida OB-GYN had attested under penalty of perjury that the state’s laws would prevent her from treating a patient in Williams’ situation because it could be viewed as a crime.
“None of these exceptions would have applied in Caroline’s case,” lawyers for Floridians Protecting Freedom wrote. “This is not just FPF’s view, it is the view of physicians who must apply Florida’s abortion ban in cases exactly like Caroline’s.”
If approved by at least 60% of voters, Amendment 4 would protect abortion rights until viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health as determined by her health care provider.
Demanding stations pull the ad is a “textbook violation of the First Amendment 4,” supporters said. Their suit seeks an injunction stopping the state from further actions, along with punitive and compensatory damages and attorney fees.
State officials appear to be gearing up for a legal battle. The Department of Health hired two law firms — Lombard Miles of Tallahassee and First and Fourteenth of Colorado — to handle legal issues related to “false political advertisements,” purchasing records show. The state agreed to pay lawyers up to $750 an hour with a total legal tab up to $1.4 million.
DeSantis’ administration also faced legal challenges over a taxpayer-funded website that proclaimed Amendment 4 “threatens women’s safety.” Last week, the Florida Supreme Court unanimously denied a petition filed by a Palm Beach County attorney accusing state officials of unlawfully interfering with the abortion measure.
In a separate case, a circuit judge rejected Floridians Protecting Freedom’s arguments that the website ran afoul of state law and said it wasn’t the role of the court to intervene.
Orlando Sentinel staff writer Jeffrey Schweers contributed to this report.