Florida government finds fault with abortion ballot measure over ads and petitions

Florida's government is finding fault on multiple fronts with an abortion rights ballot measure that Gov. Ron DeSantis opposes.

This month, the state health department has been telling television stations they could be subject to criminal charges if they continue airing one ad from Floridians Protecting Freedom that the government says is untrue and creates a “sanitary nuisance.” The ad has continued to run anyway.

Separately, on Friday, the Office of Election Crimes and Security issued a report claiming a “large number of forged signatures or fraudulent petitions” were submitted to get the question on the ballot. The state also announced a $328,000 fine against the ballot-measure group.

The campaign director for the group says that the campaign has been “above board” and that the state government is acting improperly to try to defeat the amendment.

“What we are seeing now is nothing more than dishonest distractions and desperate attempts to silence voters,” Lauren Brenzel said in a statement.

Florida is one of nine states with a measure on the Nov. 5 ballot to protect access to abortion. It's the most expensive — with about $150 million in ads so far, according to the media tracking firm AdImpact — and perhaps most consequential.

That spending total includes millions the state Republican Party has spent, at DeSantis' behest, to urge voters to reject the question. It doesn't include spending by the state health department, including for a website that asserts, “Amendment 4 threatens women's safety.” Abortion-rights advocates sued to stop the taxpayer-funded message, but a judge ruled last month that it could continue. There's also been a legal tussle over a statement on the financial impact of the ballot measure.

The measure would add an amendment to the state constitution to protect the right to abortion until fetal viability, which is considered to be somewhere over 20 weeks into pregnancy. And it could be later to preserve the life or health of the woman. The amendment would undo a law that took effect this year banning abortion in most cases after the first six weeks of pregnancy — before many women know they're pregnant.

The law, signed by DeSantis, changed the national abortion landscape. As a result, many Florida women are going out of state for abortions. And those from other places in the South with bans are also traveling farther, rather than seeking services in Florida.

For the ballot measure to be adopted, it needs support of 60% of those who vote on it. Abortion-rights advocates prevailed on all seven statewide ballot measures across the U.S. in 2022 and 2023 — but they had three-fifths support only in generally liberal California and Vermont.

One Floridians Protecting Freedom ad features a Florida mother describing how she was diagnosed with brain cancer when she was 20 weeks pregnant before a series of state restrictions went into effect.

“The doctors knew that if I did not end my pregnancy, I would lose my baby, I would lose my life, and my daughter would lose her mom,” she says, adding that the state's current law would not have allowed the abortion she received before she could begin cancer treatment.

On Oct. 4, the Florida Health Department wrote WCJB-TV in Gainesville a letter asserting that the ad was “categorically false” because abortion can be obtained after six weeks' gestational age if it's necessary to save a woman's life or “avert a serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function.”

The state said it could invoke a “sanitary nuisance” law and initiate criminal proceedings against the station.

The chair of the Federal Communications Commission blasted the threats. “The right of broadcasters to speak freely is rooted in the First Amendment,” Jessica Rosenworcel said in a statement last week. "Threats against broadcast stations for airing content that conflicts with the government’s views are dangerous and undermine the fundamental principle of free speech.”

In a letter to TV stations, the abortion-rights campaign said the ad is true because the woman in the ad was diagnosed with a terminal cancer. Abortion would not save her life, the group says, but rather extend it.

Floridians Protecting Freedom says that about 50 stations were airing the ad and that all or nearly all of them received the warning — and that they've continued to air it anyway.

Scripps, which owns four Florida stations, said all of them received the letter and kept the ad on the air. “The ads are protected by the First Amendment,” David M. Giles, the company’s chief legal officer, said in a statement Monday.

Florida Health has not responded to messages seeking comment. Neither did WCJB-TV, its owner, Gray Television, or the Florida Association of Broadcasters.

Florida's Office of Election Crimes and Security sent a report Friday to DeSantis and legislative leaders alleging fraud in the petition drive that put Amendment 4 on the ballot.

The office, formed as a result of a 2022 law, calls on the state's leaders to discuss “the adequacy of current law in addressing initiative petition fraud.”

The report alleges that people paid to gather signatures forged signatures and signed some petitions on behalf of people who had died, and that some were illegally paid per signature collected.

The agency fined Floridians Protecting Freedom $328,000, accusing it of violating election law. The group says it will contest the fine.

And Brenzel questioned why the state released the report now, as early voting has begun — and months after the signatures were certified.

The report issued Friday appears to explain what state police were working on when some showed up at voters' homes last month asking them about signing petitions to put the abortion-rights amendment on the ballot.

At the time, DeSantis defended the investigation. “Anyone who submitted a petition that is a valid voter, that is totally within their rights to do it,” DeSantis said. “We are not investigating that. What they are investigating is fraudulent petitions."