In just one week, Florida voters will head to the polls to decide whether they want enshrine the right to abortion in Florida’s constitution, thanks to a ballot measure that Gov. Ron DeSantis and his administration spent months fighting in court.

If passed, Amendment 4 — officially titled “The Amendment to Limit Government Interference in Abortion“- would prevent any law from restricting abortion before fetal viability, which is typically around 24 weeks, experts say. The amendment would repeal the state’s current six-week abortion ban, which has was enacted after the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022.

Florida is one of 10 states which will have questions related to reproductive rights on the ballot, after the overturning of Roe v. Wade left the issue to the states.

MORE: Abortion-related issues will appear on ballots in 10 states in November

A recent New York Times/Siena College poll found that 46 percent of Floridians surveyed support the measure, while 38 percent oppose it, and 16 percent refuse to answer or say they don’t know. To pass on November 5, the ballot measure will require the 60% approval of those who vote.

The governor and his allies are waging an intense campaign against the ballot initiative.

“When you deal with constitutional amendments, your default answer should always be no,” DeSantis said at a news conference last week, at which he was joined by a dozen doctors. “You can always change normal policies and legislation. Once it’s in the constitution, it’s forever. You really have no chance of ever changing it.”

Earlier this month, the Florida Department of Health sent letters to television stations across the state, including ABC affiliates, asking them not to air advertising supporting the ballot initiative and threatening criminal proceedings against channels that do not comply. The ad featured a Florida mother describing how she was diagnosed with brain cancer two years ago, when she was 20 weeks pregnant.

“The doctors knew that if I didn’t terminate my pregnancy, I would lose my baby, I would lose my life and my daughter would lose her mother,” Florida resident Caroline Williams said in the ad, saying she believed that ‘she would have died. dead if she had been diagnosed under the state’s current six-week abortion ban, which came into force earlier this year.

After Floridians Protecting Freedom, the group behind the ballot initiative, sued the state for threatening “criminal action” against broadcast stations, a federal judge issued a restraining order against the surgeon general of Florida, prohibiting the Department of Health from threatening stations.

“To put it simply for the State of Florida: It’s the First Amendment, stupid,” U.S. District Judge Mark Walker wrote in the ruling.

John Wilson, the Health Department lawyer who signed the letters to the TV stations, resigned two weeks ago, saying in a signed affidavit that DeSantis’ lawyers wrote the letters and asked him to send under his name.

“I resigned from my position as general counsel rather than comply with directives … to send more correspondence to the media,” Wilson said in the affidavit. “The right of broadcasters to express themselves freely is rooted in the First Amendment. Threats against broadcast stations that broadcast content inconsistent with the government’s views are dangerous and undermine the fundamental principle of free speech.”

DeSantis’ critics say the letter threatening broadcasters may not have been his administration’s only attempt at intimidation.

MORE: Florida voters may consider abortion rights ballot measure in November, court ruling says

Last month, two Florida residents reported that law enforcement from the Office of Election Crimes & Security, a unit created by DeSantis in 2022, knocked on their doors and asked them about the petitions that They had signed to obtain the amendment on the November ballot, Miami. » reported the Herald.

“I had indeed signed a petition asking that the right to abortion be placed on the ballot in Florida,” said Isaac Menasche, one of the residents, in a message on Facebook. “This experience shook me. What disturbed me was that (the police officer) had a file with me containing my personal information.”

DeSantis defended the Election Crimes Unit’s actions, saying at a news conference last month that there were “a lot of complaints” about a group that supported Amendment 4.

“They’re doing what they’re supposed to do,” DeSantis said of the Elections Crime Unit. “They respect the law.”

The Election Crimes Unit also released a report last month alleging that Floridians Protecting Liberty committed petition fraud to reach the 891,523 signatures needed to place the amendment on the ballot. The group has denied any wrongdoing.

MORE: Abortion rights ballot measures lead in polls

“These lawsuits, which follow the State of Florida’s latest attempt to undermine Floridians’ right to vote on Amendment 4, are desperate,” said Yes on 4 Campaign Director Lauren Brenzel. supporting the amendment. “Ask yourself why this is happening now – more than six months after more than 997,000 petitions were verified by the State of Florida and less than a month before the election – that these anti-abortion extremists want to restart the collection petitions.

“That’s because our campaign is winning and the government and its extremist allies are trying to do everything they can to prevent Floridians from having the rights they deserve,” Brenzel said.

Fight Intensifies Over Florida Ballot Measure That Would Guarantee Abortion Rights Until Fetal Viability originally appeared on abcnews.go.com