Two different lawsuits were filed Wednesday regarding Amendment 4, the Amendment to Limit Government Interference with Abortion. One was filed against Florida Department of Health figureheads. The other was filed against the group responsible for Amendment 4 appearing on the November ballot.
First, Floridians Protecting Freedom, Inc., the group responsible for getting the amendment on the ballot, filed a lawsuit against the FDOH surgeon general, Joseph Ladapo, and the department’s general counsel John Wilson. According to court documents, Ladapo and Wilson signed off on letters sent to TV stations airing a pro-Amendment 4 advertisement, threatening the stations with litigation if they didn’t remove the ads.
At least one Fort Myers station pulled the ads.
On Thursday, a federal judge blocked FDOH from threatening legal action against the stations.
Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker ruled an order granting a temporary injunction.
“To keep it simple for the State of Florida: it’s the First Amendment, stupid,” Walker said in his ruling. “While Defendant Ladapo refuses to even agree with this simple fact, the plaintiff’s political advertisement is political speech—speech at the core of the First Amendment.”
The Floridian’s Protecting Freedom ad, called “Caroline,” depicts a pregnant woman who was diagnosed with a brain tumor and required an abortion if she were to seek treatment. She had the abortion in 2022, and states she would not have been able to have had an abortion with Florida’s current laws. The ad began airing on Oct. 1.
Also on Wednesday, former Florida Supreme Court Justice Alan Lawson filed a suit on behalf of an anti-Amendment 4 group, Florida’s Voice for the Unborn, against Floridians Protecting Freedom and several others, alleging the group did not get the required number of signatures to place Amendment 4 on the November ballot.
“If it turns out that the evidence is as we know it to be from the report that there aren't enough signatures for it to legally be on the ballot, then it will not become law, even if it had enough votes to make it law.”Former Florida Supreme Court Justice Alan Lawson
Lawson filed the lawsuit in Orange County and named Glen Gilzen, the county’s Supervisor of Elections, among the defendants. Twenty other supervisors of elections from around Florida were also named.
“The [Supervisors of Elections] defendants failed to conduct a sufficient review before verifying Amendment 4's petition forms and signatures,” according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit claims evidence of fraud that was published on Oct. 11 by the Department of State and Office of Election Crimes and Security.
“It was so rampant, the fraud, that almost 20% of the signatures that were turned in were forged signatures and were not real signatures of registered voters who were authorized,” Lawson said.
Earlier this year, Floridians Protecting Freedom turned over a petition for Amendment 4 with over 1 million Floridian signatures. Legally, the petition needed nearly 900,000 signatures to qualify for the November ballot.
The investigation cites evidence that petitions were signed on behalf of deceased people, contained forgeries or signature misrepresentations and used personal identifying information without elector consent. The suit also alleges that Floridians Protecting Freedom hired a California company to gather fraudulent signatures. According to the suit, 16.4% of the signatures weren’t valid, which would leave the petition 60,000 signatures short of qualifying.
The lawsuit is asking courts to disqualify Amendment 4 from the November ballot.
Lawson doesn’t expect the suit to arrive in a court before Election Day, which is just weeks away. He said that doesn’t matter.
“If it turns out that the evidence is as we know it to be from the report that there aren't enough signatures for it to legally be on the ballot, then it will not become law, even if it had enough votes to make it law,” he said.
Members of Floridians Protecting Freedom said the recent lawsuit is an attempt to keep Floridians from voicing their decision regarding state abortion laws.
“Despite the Florida Supreme Court’s determination that the measure met the threshold for ballot placement months ago, opponents are still trying to interfere with Floridians’ ability to decide our fate for ourselves,” said Keisha Mulfort, communications strategist with the American Civil Liberties Union, which is part of the group.
“Floridians see this farce for what it is, and as Election Day nears, are more motivated than ever to vote Yes on 4 to overturn this extreme abortion ban,” Mulfort said.
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