Florida's threat of criminal charges against TV stations blasted as unconstitutional

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Florida’s threat of criminal charges against local TV stations running ads supporting the state’s abortion amendment is unconstitutional, the head of the Federal Communications Commission said.

“The right of broadcasters to speak freely is rooted in the First Amendment,” Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in a statement released late Tuesday. “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 unprecedented move, the Florida Department of Health’s General Counsel John Wilson sent a letter to local TV stations last week 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.

The letters from Wilson to stations in Tampa, Gainesville, Sarasota, Panama City and others were first reported by Orlando-area investigative reporter Jason Garcia on his Seeking Rents substack.

It’s the latest attack by the DeSantis administration against Amendment 4, which if approved by 60% or more of Florida’s voters would overturn the six-week abortion ban he signed into law last year.

In the 30-second Florida TV spots, a Tampa Bay woman named Caroline recounts the traumatic experience of discovering she had stage four, terminal brain cancer when she was 20 weeks pregnant. “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.

The ads were paid for by Floridians Protecting Freedom, which wants voters to approve Amendment 4 on Nov. 5. The amendment would preserve abortion rights in the state constitution and allow the procedure until the time of viability, usually about 24 weeks into a pregnancy.

Wilson said the ad was not only false, it was dangerous, and a “sanitary nuisance” because it threatened or impaired the health or life of an individual or people.

“Women faced with pregnancy complications posing a serious risk of death or substantial and irreversible physical impairment may and should seek medical treatment in Florida,” Wilson said in his letter to the TV stations.

If they believe that such treatment is unavailable, women could travel out of state to seek emergency medical care, get it from unlicensed providers in Florida or skip care all together, he said.

Pro-abortion groups also have criticized DeSantis for directing state taxpayer dollars to the Agency for Health Care Administration, so it could create and run ads on its website arguing Amendment 4’s passage would harm women. The site also warns that Amendment 4 could result in the Florida Legislature losing the ability to enact “common-sense health care regulations” for abortion, potentially putting women in danger.

The ballot initiative summary, however, says, in part: “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.”

The American Civil Liberties of Florida and Southern Legal Counsel have filed a lawsuit against the state for spreading misinformation on its website and in TV and radio ads.

“This kind of propaganda issued by the state, using taxpayer money and operating outside of the political process, sets a dangerous precedent,” Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, said in a statement. “This is what we would expect to see from an authoritarian regime, not in the so-called ‘Free State of Florida.’”

The Elias Law Group, which represents Floridians Protecting Freedom, blasted the health department’s letter to the TV stations as “an unconstitutional state action.”

“The Letter is a textbook example of government coercion that violates the First Amendment,” the law firm said in its own letter to the stations. It also said that public officials are forbidden from using their position to suppress speech by threatening legal sanctions.

The firm said the ad’s statements are true and the department has failed to show evidence that Caroline’s statements are false.

The firm also said Wilson’s letter vaguely describes the Florida’s current law but doesn’t explain how hard it is to obtain an abortion after six weeks. A woman, for example, a would need to find a doctor willing to perform an abortion after getting two other physicians to say the procedure was necessary to save the woman’s life.

Also, a woman would need to provide documentation, such as a police report, to show her pregnancy was the result of rape or incest in order to get an abortion, and that would only be up to 15 weeks of pregnancy.

_____