Florida Governor Ron DeSantis stands by a 15-week abortion ban law after signing it into law on April 14, 2022 in Kissimmee, Florida.

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John Raoux/AP

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A federal judge who recently punished Florida officials for “trampling” free speech rights continued to block the head of the state's health department from taking further steps to threaten television networks with the commercials pro-abortion rights measure will be put on the ballot next week.

U.S. District Judge Mark Walker extended a preliminary injunction and sided with Floridians Defending Freedom, the group that created the ads for the ballot question that would add abortion rights to the state constitution when it passes Nov. 5 is adopted.

Walker announced the decision from the bench after hearing arguments from campaign lawyers and state officials. The order expands on an earlier order prohibiting State Surgeon General Joseph Ladapo from taking any further action to coerce or intimidate broadcasters running the commercials.

Walker said extending the injunction will give him more time to rule on the injunction the abortion rights campaign is seeking. The order lasts until Election Day and ends Nov. 12 unless the judge rules before then.

The group filed the lawsuit after Ladapo and John Wilson, who was then the top lawyer at the state Department of Health before he unexpectedly resigned, sent a letter to television stations on Oct. 3 asking them to stop running an advertisement for to shut down abortion rights, claiming that doing so was wrong and dangerous. The letter also states that broadcasters could face criminal prosecution.

The controversial ad features a woman named Caroline Williams who said current Florida law – which bans most abortions after six weeks – would have denied her the procedure her doctors believed was necessary to prolong her life after She had been diagnosed with terminal brain disease. In 2022, she developed cancer. Her doctors refused to continue her cancer treatment while she was still pregnant.

A lawyer for the state argued that the claims in the ad were dangerously misleading and could put Floridians at risk if they do not seek medical care because they believe all abortions are banned in the state.

Spreading “false information about the availability of life-saving medical services” is not protected by the Constitution, prosecutors wrote in court papers.

At Tuesday's hearing, attorney Brian Barnes compared the FPF ad to a hypothetical commercial that falsely claims the state's emergency alert system has been shut down, resulting in a public health emergency.

“We expect this case to be governed by the same legal principles that would apply to the hypothetical 911,” Barnes said.

An attorney for FPF claims that “the ad is true” and that it features a Florida resident describing her own medical conditions in her own words.

Attorney Ben Stafford argued that robust free speech protections are critical to a functioning democracy, particularly in matters where there are clear differences of opinion over difficult moral and religious issues such as abortion.

“The First Amendment leaves such matters to the public marketplace of ideas,” Stafford said, “and not to the whims of a government censor.”

The decision, which Walker issued Tuesday, extends an Oct. 18 order prohibiting state officials from “trampling” the free speech rights of those with whom they disagree.

“The government cannot excuse its indirect censorship of political speech simply by declaring the disapproved speech 'false,'” the judge said in the previous order.

He added: “To keep it simple for the state of Florida: It's the First Amendment, stupid.”

Tuesday's hearing is the latest development in an ongoing battle between abortion rights advocates and officials in the administration of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has waged his own state-funded campaign to block the ballot measure.

If 60% of Florida voters approve, the constitutional amendment would protect the right to abortion until the fetus is viable, which is assumed to be longer than 20 weeks. The measure would override current state law that bans most abortions after six weeks, before many women realize they are pregnant.

In the weeks leading up to the election, DeSantis held taxpayer-funded campaign rallies with doctors and religious leaders to lobby against the proposed change. Four state agencies have committed millions of dollars in public money to produce their own commercials railing against the abortion measure and another proposed constitutional amendment that would legalize recreational marijuana use in the state – a move that critics say violates a state law , which bars government officials from using their public office for campaign purposes.

At a media event Tuesday in Naples attended by doctors who oppose the ballot measure, DeSantis claimed that providers who say state law prohibits them from performing abortions on patients in medical distress are “totally lying” and should lose their medical license.

The Associated Press and other news organizations have reported cases in which Florida women were denied care after a miscarriage or nonviable pregnancy, despite the risk of serious complications, because providers feared legal consequences if the patient's life was not deemed sufficiently at risk became.

“Any suggestion, any advertising, anything that suggests that Florida law in any way prevents a doctor from providing care to anyone in Florida, to women, to pregnant mothers, is a lie,” DeSantis said.

The AP previously reported on a case in Florida in which a doctor admitted that state law complicated emergency pregnancy care.

“Because of the new laws … staff cannot intervene unless there is a threat to the patient's health,” a doctor at Memorial Regional Hospital in Hollywood, Florida, told an investigator looking into whether the hospital did not offer an abortion to a woman whose water broke at 15 weeks, long before the fetus could survive.