Group sues Florida for harassing TV stations airing abortion rights ads

An abortion rights group in Florida is suing state officials for suppressing free speech. In their lawsuit, they allege that the state unconstitutionally threatened television stations that aired their ads in favor of a ballot initiative that would overturn Florida’s extreme abortion ban.

Florida currently restricts all abortions after six weeks of pregnancy and only allows nominal exceptions in cases of rape, incest or when a person’s life is in danger – a standard that is rarely allowed in practice due to the ambiguous language of the statute and the doctors ‘The fear of being persecuted. The ballot initiative in question, also known as Amendment 4, would expand the right to abortion to the point of fetal viability, which is generally considered to be 22 to 25 weeks of gestation. Regulation of abortion can take place afterwards, but this should not be at the expense of the life or health of a pregnant person.

Floridians Protecting Freedom (FPF), the group organizing efforts to pass the amendment through a statewide vote, produced commercials that aired on dozens of stations across Florida early this month. As a result, these stations received threatening letters from the Florida Department of Health, dubiously claiming that they had violated the state’s nuisance laws and that the advertisement was misleading. At least one station stopped airing the ad in response to the state’s letter.

On Wednesday, the FPF filed a federal lawsuit claiming the state is wrong in its claims and that it is violating the group’s free speech rights by trying to limit where its ad can air.

The FPF is seeking an injunction to stop officials in Florida from “taking further actions to directly or indirectly impact television stations, broadcasters or other parties” for airing political ads in favor of the abortion amendment.

The organization states the following in its lawsuit:

The elections are only three weeks away, and the FPF is active and plans to continue showing television advertisements and making other political speeches advocating the adoption of Amendment 4 and drawing attention to the dangerous impacts of current Florida law on women’s rights and health. It is unacceptable that the FPF does this while the state dangles a sword of Damocles over anyone who would facilitate this core political expression – by threatening broadcasters with criminal prosecution if they express views that the state does not agree with, and thereby to silence the FPF’s speech.

“The state seeks to censor core political speech with which it disagrees,” the lawsuit further states.

Officials within Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration have taken several actions in recent months to prevent voters from having the opportunity to vote on the amendment. The state has also tried to punish the FPF and other abortion rights organizers, including by attacking supporters of the measure with visits from state police.

Just last week, the state announced it was fining FPF $328,000 over the way it collected signatures for the ballot measure, claiming the group had forged signatures — a claim the FPF says is blatantly untrue.

“What we are seeing now is nothing more than unfair distractions and desperate attempts to silence voters,” said the group’s campaign director Lauren Brenzel.

The measure faces difficult (but not impossible) chances of passage. Unlike other abortion measures across the U.S. that will be put to the vote in November, the Florida measure requires a supermajority vote — 60 percent approval from voters — to be enshrined in the state constitution. Recent polls show that it will be a close battle, and that while a majority of residents will almost certainly approve of the vote, it may not meet the threshold needed to become law and overturn the six-week ban to make.