Florida has an important vote on election day, and that is Amendment 4 that seeks to protect the right to abortion. Florida Republicans had pushed through a law banning abortions after six-weeks, which is effectively a total ban. The Amendment seeks to allow abortions until fetal viability, which is around 22-24 weeks. (I have written about this before.)

Supporters of Amendment 4 had put out the following ad.

Florida’s health department issued an order to TV stations not to air the ads because it was false, since they claim that the law does permit abortions in medical emergencies. But doctors are fearful of doing so under almost any circumstances because the law about exceptions is vague. If TV stations aired the ad, they were threatened with a second-degree misdemeanor, “which carries a sentence of up to 60 days imprisoned or a fine of up to $500.”

But yesterday, a judge struck down that order, saying that it was a blatant violation of the First Amendment.

On Thursday, [US district judge Mark E] Walker granted a temporary restraining order blocking Ladapo from taking any further action against broadcasters or other media outlets that might air ads by Floridians Protecting Freedom.

“Of course, the surgeon general of Florida has the right to advocate for his own position on a ballot measure,” Walker wrote. “But it would subvert the rule of law to permit the state to transform its own advocacy into the direct suppression of protected political speech.”

The judge was harsh in his opinion.

“The government cannot excuse its indirect censorship of political speech simply by declaring the disfavored speech is ‘false’,” US district judge Mark E Walker wrote in his ruling. “To keep it simple for the State of Florida: it’s the First Amendment, stupid.”

The letter to Florida TV stations had been sent by the state’s surgeon general Joseph Ladapo (an utter extremist) and John Wilson, the top attorney for the Florida Department of Health. Interestingly, Wilson resigned his post seven days after sending the letter and his resignation letter suggests that it was due to discomfort with how the agency was proceeding.

When he abruptly resigned from his post last week, the top attorney for the Florida Department of Health suggested in a resignation letter that he was uncomfortable with decisions taken by the state agency, which days earlier had threatened to prosecute television stations over political advertisements.

“A man is nothing without his conscience,” John Wilson wrote in a resignation letter obtained by the Herald/Times. “It has become clear in recent days that I cannot join you on the road that lies before the agency.”
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Wilson, whose exit from the Department of Health was previously reported by the Herald/Times, declined to comment through his attorney. Wilson, who had served as the agency’s general counsel since 2022, noted in his letter that he had worked for the state for 14 years. In his resignation letter, Wilson lamented the circumstances that made him feel like he could no longer work for the Department of Health.

Ron De Santis is an extremist and has packed his administration with other anti-science extremists like Ladapo, whose bio shows that attending elite education institutions does not inoculate you against crackpot ideas.

He has been warned by the CDC for promoting COVID-19 misinformation, vaccine hesitancy, and opposing various measures to control COVID-19. “This has led to unnecessary death, severe illness and hospitalization.”

After immigrating to the United States from Nigeria, Ladapo earned an M.D. and a Ph.D. in Health Policy from Harvard University. He served as a professor of medicine at New York University before being tenured at the University of California, Los Angeles, prior to his appointment to his current position by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Ladapo promoted unproven treatments, opposed vaccine and mask mandates, questioned the safety of COVID-19 vaccines, and contradicted professional medical organizations.

Ladapo has opposed gender-affirming care and counseling for transgender and nonbinary minors.
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Across 2022, Ladapo has also focused on opposing transgender health care, accusing professional organizations such as the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Endocrine Society of being politically motivated to support such causes. He opposes gender-affirming care and counseling, hormonal therapies, related medications for transgender and nonbinary children and teenagers, and social-transition tools such as pronoun and name changes.

On March 10, 2023, Ladapo was publicly rebuked by the CDC and FDA for disseminating vaccine misinformation in response to a letter he wrote to the agencies that had misinterpreted data from the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS).

It is mind-boggling that such a person is the chief medical officer of a state. I wonder how the academic institutions he worked at before did not notice his blatantly anti-science views or if they came to prominence only after he took the job in Florida.