CORAL GABLES, Fla. – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis used an official visit to Coral Gables on Monday to continue his campaign against a taxpayer-funded abortion rights amendment.
After a month spent informing Floridians about the hurricanes, DeSantis has now focused his official office on combating Amendment 4, hosting a state-funded rally-style event just two weeks before the election.
Monday’s event, which concluded with a prayer from Miami’s archbishop and lieutenant governor asking people not to vote as atheists, came after the Health Department’s top attorney resigned over a letter he said The governor’s office forced him to send television stations to stop an ad in favor of Amendment 4.
“When it comes to constitutional amendments, your default position should always be no,” DeSantis said at the event, which was attended by doctors who oppose the abortion amendment.
“Normal policies and laws can always be modified. Once something is in the constitution, it is permanent. There is no possibility of changing it.”
Before the event, former Health Department chief counsel John Wilson signed an affidavit claiming that DeSantis’ lawyers drafted a letter on his behalf and told him to send it to television stations, threatening legal action if they continued. broadcasting the Yes on 4 announcement.
Wilson said in his statement Monday that he subsequently resigned rather than send more letters. Last week, a judge blocked the department from taking further threatening action against the stations over the ads. Floridians Protecting Freedom, the group that produced the commercial, filed a lawsuit Wednesday over the state’s communications with the stations.
“This affidavit exposes state interference at the highest level. It is clear that the state is determined to keep Florida’s unpopular and cruel abortion ban in place,” Yes on 4 campaign director Lauren Brenzel said in a statement emailed to reporters. “Their extreme attacks on Amendment 4 are an undemocratic tactic.”
The ballot measure is one of nine similar ones across the country, but the campaign on it is the most expensive yet, with ads costing about $160 million, according to media tracking company AdImpact.
To be adopted, it would need the approval of 60% of voters and would overturn the state law that prohibits abortion in most cases after the first six weeks of pregnancy, before many women know they are pregnant.
The DeSantis administration has taken multiple actions against the ballot measure. During Monday’s event, a large crowd cheered DeSantis’ criticism of the amendment. However, the loudest applause went to Lieutenant Governor Jeanette Núñez.
After one of the doctors said that her opposition to the amendment was not religious, Núñez stated that for her it was.
“We cannot go to church and pray as Christians and then vote as atheists,” Núñez said, receiving a long standing ovation.
The event concluded with a prayer from Miami Archbishop Thomas Wenski.
“We pray…that you would awaken in every heart of the citizens of this great state of Florida respect for the work of your hands and renew among your people the willingness to care for and sustain your precious gift of human life,” Wenski said .
A group critical of DeSantis issued a statement condemning the use of government resources to organize the event against Amendment 4.
“DeSantis continued to use the state government against its own citizens by coordinating a taxpayer-funded press conference with the political campaign opposed to Amendment 4, in his attempt to silence the voices of doctors and patients affected by the extreme abortion ban. in Florida,” said DeSantis Watch spokesperson Anders Croy.
