If you want a glimpse into what Project 2025’s education agenda might look like if implemented nationwide, look no further than Florida, where Gov. Ron DeSantis has already been leading book-banning, inflaming culture wars over LGBTQ rights, and dismantling comprehensive sex education.

Recent reporting by the Orlando Sentinel revealed that Florida state officials are pressuring some districts to adopt an abstinence-only approach, stripping students of basic knowledge about contraception, anatomy, and human development. Students are being taught abstinence as the sole method of avoiding pregnancy and STDs, and terms like “abuse,” “fluids,” and “LGBTQ” are absent from classrooms. “Under recent changes to state law,” reports the Associated Press, “it’s now up to the Florida Department of Education to sign off on school districts’ curriculum on reproductive health and disease education if they use teaching materials other than the state’s designated textbook.”

This week, Mother Jones Creator Kat Abughazaleh analyzes one of these state-approved plans, “Real Essentials,” which encourages “spiritual intimacy” and traditional marriage. The plan’s author has a history of citing pro-abstinence education research from the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank behind Project 2025.

Florida’s approach is a test for a much broader movement, Kat argues. Just pages into Project 2025, you’ll find a promise to register “educators and public librarians” who purvey “pornography”—a term so vaguely defined as to potentially include any term currently being weaponized in the culture war—as registered “sex offenders.” Another section calls for provisions to prevent types of sex education that might “promote prostitution, or provide a funnel effect for abortion facilities and school field trips to clinics.”

For more details, watch Kat’s full breakdown of Florida’s new sex education laws.

When the US Supreme Court overturned the federal right to an abortion in its 2022 Dobbs decision, one argument the justices made was that it was not banning abortion across the country, but rather granting states, and their voters, the opportunity to regulate the procedure. Since then, seven states have voted on their local abortion laws through ballot measures. From the liberal paradises of Vermont and California to redder states like Ohio and Kansas, all seven voted to protect abortion. In November, 10 more states are using ballot measures to address the topic, too.

Among them is Florida. Until 2022, the state allowed abortions until the third trimester. But since Dobbs, the state first enacted a ban on abortions after 15- weeks gestation, and subsequently a ban on abortions after six weeks, which took effect in May.

Floridians Protecting Freedom (FPF) is trying to change that with Amendment 4, which the reproductive rights group added to Florida’s November ballots by collecting more than 900,000 signatures. If enough Floridians vote “yes” on the ballot measure (official summary shown below), the referendum will theoretically enshrine in the Florida Constitution the right to abortion access up until fetal viability—which is generally around 23 to 24 weeks. As the referendum states:

No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider. This amendment does not change the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.

More than half of Florida voters support expanding abortion rights, according to polling by both Florida Atlantic University and the Hill/Emerson College. But whether this support ultimately alters the abortion landscape in the state is a different question.

That’s because Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is using the power of his administration to threaten the initiative. He’s appointed people to the Financial Impact Estimating Conference—a panel responsible for gauging potential costs of ballot measures—that required the amendment be accompanied by language stating, without evidence, that access to abortion may cost taxpayer dollars. State law enforcement has also been sent to question Floridians who signed the petition for Amendment 4 to appear on the ballot. He’s enlisted a state agency to create a misleading website about abortions in Florida. Local television channels playing an advertisement supporting Amendment 4 have also been threatened with prosecution over the alleged violation of Florida’s sanitary nuisance law, which is generally used to combat health risks like the improper disposal of human waste or dead animals.

On Friday, DeSantis further escalated his intimidation campaign when his state department released a 348-page preliminary report alleging FPF may have committed “widespread petition fraud” to reach the 891,000 signature Florida statute requires to advance ballot measures. In a statement, FPF says its campaign has been “run above board and followed state law at every turn.” Further, the state deadline to challenge amendment signatures has already passed.

Anna Hochkammer, the executive director of the Florida Women’s Freedom Coalition, says the administration is “using the resources of the state to suppress the purest form of democracy, which in this case is necessary because an entrenched unrepresentative cabal of elected officials refuses to legislate in accordance with the overwhelming preferences of the citizens…Despite all of that, we are unbowed and unbroken.”

“An entrenched unrepresentative cabal of elected officials refuses to legislate in accordance with the overwhelming preferences of the citizens…Despite all of that, we are unbowed and unbroken.”

But the report could provide basis for a new, albeit insincere, legal argument against the ballot measure—and it seems it already has. On Wednesday, anti-abortion advocates filed a lawsuit citing the state missive, alleging that, “When all fictitious, forged, illegally obtained, or otherwise invalid signatures are removed from consideration, Amendment 4 failed to reach the constitutionally required number of signatures for ballot placement.” Accordingly, the lawsuit against FPF says, “The invalid petitions must be stricken and Amendment 4 removed from the 2024 General Election.”

DeSantis didn’t personally wage the lawsuit, but he did tee it up for the petitioners who did. Such tactics should not be surprising. Other GOP leaders, such as Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state lawmakers in Missouri, respectively tried to thwart similar initiatives through politically motivated lawsuits, exaggerated cost estimates, disinformation, and more.

As my colleague Ari Berman points out in his recent magazine story, this is particularly concerning because ballot measures are the only method in which majority rule by a plurality of a state’s citizens can supersede the minority rule of increasingly and disproportionately powerful GOP state lawmakers who have re-drawn districts to benefit them staying in power.

In hyper-gerrymandered states like Ohio, the only way to ensure that the will of the majority is followed is to override representative democracy and go directly to the people. This strategy has taken on renewed urgency in response to recent US Supreme Court decisions taking away fundamental rights, from the gutting of the Voting Rights Act to the overturning of Roe v. Wade. These initiatives can garner support across party lines in a way that is otherwise impossible in a highly polarized partisan political climate.

The Supreme Court explicitly noted that the solution to abortion access is not—in the majority’s opinion—protected by the US Constitution. Instead, as Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in his concurring opinion, the 2022 Dobbs decision “properly returns the Court to a position of neutrality and restores the people’s authority to address the issue of abortion through the processes of democratic self-government.”

In other words, the court said, abortion is an issue that should be regulated through voting: either for political candidates whose reproductive rights views align with those of the voters or, even more directly, for ballot measures.

This is also—in theory—the party line of the GOP. In his presidential campaign, former President Donald Trump has emphasized this point. “It’s all about the states, it’s about state rights. States’ rights,” Trump told Time magazine in April. “States are going to make their own determinations.”

Even without DeSantis putting his thumb on the scale, Florida already had a high bar for passing referenda: As of 2006, 60 percent of voters are required to amend the state’s constitution. Among conservative-leaning states—Kansas, Kentucky, Ohio—that have voted on abortion ballot measures, none have had to hit that high a mark. (Kansas was closest, at 59 percent).

Organizers of Amendment 4 say they believe Florida could be the first state to do so, but it’s a harder task when the DeSantis administration is engaging in what Hochkammer calls “asshole politics,” which values “power and posturing over good policy.”

For example, both the proponents and opponents of Amendment 4 have television advertisements in Florida. A pro-Amendment 4 ad depicts a woman describing how a pre-ban abortion saved her life when she found out she had a brain tumor while also pregnant with her second child. “The doctors knew that if I did not end my pregnancy, I would lose my baby. I would lose my life. And my daughter would lose her mom,” the mom says in the 30-second clip. “Florida has now banned abortion even in cases like mine.”

Florida’s Department of Health alleged the advertisement was false in cease-and-desist letters, citing Florida’s “exception” to save the life of a mother. But many physicians, who risk fines and prison time, argue that life-or-death scenarios are extremely complicated and often do not conform to the vague language of abortion-ban exceptions.

In the case of the woman who had a brain tumor, her diagnosis was terminal. According to a lawsuit filed in federal court by Floridians Protecting Freedom on Wednesday, the woman would not have met the requirements for an exception because an abortion only would have “extend[ed]” her life, not saved it. There are post-ban examples, too.

In another case, a 15-week pregnant woman was leaking amniotic fluid for an hour in a Broward County, Florida, hospital waiting room. Her ultrasound showed she had no amniotic fluid around her fetus, a condition that can quickly lead to serious infection and death. She was discharged and miscarried in a public restroom later that day, at which point was rushed to another hospital and put on a ventilator. She stayed in the hospital for six days.

“When you don’t want to talk about the fact that your state has an abortion ban that’s forced rape survivors to go out of state for care, that’s led to women almost losing their lives,” FPF campaign director Lauren Brenzel recently told Mother Jones, “you create distractions because you don’t want to talk about the harmful policy that you’ve implemented.” She added, “It’s not shocking. It’s the national playbook.”

When the US Supreme Court overturned the federal right to an abortion in its 2022 Dobbs decision, one argument the justices made was that it was not banning abortion across the country, but rather granting states, and their voters, the opportunity to regulate the procedure. Since then, seven states have voted on their local abortion laws through ballot measures. From the liberal paradises of Vermont and California to redder states like Ohio and Kansas, all seven voted to protect abortion. In November, 10 more states are using ballot measures to address the topic, too.

Among them is Florida. Until 2022, the state allowed abortions until the third trimester. But since Dobbs, the state first enacted a ban on abortions after 15- weeks gestation, and subsequently a ban on abortions after six weeks, which took effect in May.

Floridians Protecting Freedom (FPF) is trying to change that with Amendment 4, which the reproductive rights group added to Florida’s November ballots by collecting more than 900,000 signatures. If enough Floridians vote “yes” on the ballot measure (official summary shown below), the referendum will theoretically enshrine in the Florida Constitution the right to abortion access up until fetal viability—which is generally around 23 to 24 weeks. As the referendum states:

No law shall prohibit, penalize, delay, or restrict abortion before viability or when necessary to protect the patient’s health, as determined by the patient’s healthcare provider. This amendment does not change the Legislature’s constitutional authority to require notification to a parent or guardian before a minor has an abortion.

More than half of Florida voters support expanding abortion rights, according to polling by both Florida Atlantic University and the Hill/Emerson College. But whether this support ultimately alters the abortion landscape in the state is a different question.

That’s because Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis is using the power of his administration to threaten the initiative. He’s appointed people to the Financial Impact Estimating Conference—a panel responsible for gauging potential costs of ballot measures—that required the amendment be accompanied by language stating, without evidence, that access to abortion may cost taxpayer dollars. State law enforcement has also been sent to question Floridians who signed the petition for Amendment 4 to appear on the ballot. He’s enlisted a state agency to create a misleading website about abortions in Florida. Local television channels playing an advertisement supporting Amendment 4 have also been threatened with prosecution over the alleged violation of Florida’s sanitary nuisance law, which is generally used to combat health risks like the improper disposal of human waste or dead animals.

On Friday, DeSantis further escalated his intimidation campaign when his state department released a 348-page preliminary report alleging FPF may have committed “widespread petition fraud” to reach the 891,000 signature Florida statute requires to advance ballot measures. In a statement, FPF says its campaign has been “run above board and followed state law at every turn.” Further, the state deadline to challenge amendment signatures has already passed.

Anna Hochkammer, the executive director of the Florida Women’s Freedom Coalition, says the administration is “using the resources of the state to suppress the purest form of democracy, which in this case is necessary because an entrenched unrepresentative cabal of elected officials refuses to legislate in accordance with the overwhelming preferences of the citizens…Despite all of that, we are unbowed and unbroken.”

“An entrenched unrepresentative cabal of elected officials refuses to legislate in accordance with the overwhelming preferences of the citizens…Despite all of that, we are unbowed and unbroken.”

But the report could provide basis for a new, albeit insincere, legal argument against the ballot measure—and it seems it already has. On Wednesday, anti-abortion advocates filed a lawsuit citing the state missive, alleging that, “When all fictitious, forged, illegally obtained, or otherwise invalid signatures are removed from consideration, Amendment 4 failed to reach the constitutionally required number of signatures for ballot placement.” Accordingly, the lawsuit against FPF says, “The invalid petitions must be stricken and Amendment 4 removed from the 2024 General Election.”

DeSantis didn’t personally wage the lawsuit, but he did tee it up for the petitioners who did. Such tactics should not be surprising. Other GOP leaders, such as Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose and state lawmakers in Missouri, respectively tried to thwart similar initiatives through politically motivated lawsuits, exaggerated cost estimates, disinformation, and more.

As my colleague Ari Berman points out in his recent magazine story, this is particularly concerning because ballot measures are the only method in which majority rule by a plurality of a state’s citizens can supersede the minority rule of increasingly and disproportionately powerful GOP state lawmakers who have re-drawn districts to benefit them staying in power.

In hyper-gerrymandered states like Ohio, the only way to ensure that the will of the majority is followed is to override representative democracy and go directly to the people. This strategy has taken on renewed urgency in response to recent US Supreme Court decisions taking away fundamental rights, from the gutting of the Voting Rights Act to the overturning of Roe v. Wade. These initiatives can garner support across party lines in a way that is otherwise impossible in a highly polarized partisan political climate.

The Supreme Court explicitly noted that the solution to abortion access is not—in the majority’s opinion—protected by the US Constitution. Instead, as Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in his concurring opinion, the 2022 Dobbs decision “properly returns the Court to a position of neutrality and restores the people’s authority to address the issue of abortion through the processes of democratic self-government.”

In other words, the court said, abortion is an issue that should be regulated through voting: either for political candidates whose reproductive rights views align with those of the voters or, even more directly, for ballot measures.

This is also—in theory—the party line of the GOP. In his presidential campaign, former President Donald Trump has emphasized this point. “It’s all about the states, it’s about state rights. States’ rights,” Trump told Time magazine in April. “States are going to make their own determinations.”

Even without DeSantis putting his thumb on the scale, Florida already had a high bar for passing referenda: As of 2006, 60 percent of voters are required to amend the state’s constitution. Among conservative-leaning states—Kansas, Kentucky, Ohio—that have voted on abortion ballot measures, none have had to hit that high a mark. (Kansas was closest, at 59 percent).

Organizers of Amendment 4 say they believe Florida could be the first state to do so, but it’s a harder task when the DeSantis administration is engaging in what Hochkammer calls “asshole politics,” which values “power and posturing over good policy.”

For example, both the proponents and opponents of Amendment 4 have television advertisements in Florida. A pro-Amendment 4 ad depicts a woman describing how a pre-ban abortion saved her life when she found out she had a brain tumor while also pregnant with her second child. “The doctors knew that if I did not end my pregnancy, I would lose my baby. I would lose my life. And my daughter would lose her mom,” the mom says in the 30-second clip. “Florida has now banned abortion even in cases like mine.”

Florida’s Department of Health alleged the advertisement was false in cease-and-desist letters, citing Florida’s “exception” to save the life of a mother. But many physicians, who risk fines and prison time, argue that life-or-death scenarios are extremely complicated and often do not conform to the vague language of abortion-ban exceptions.

In the case of the woman who had a brain tumor, her diagnosis was terminal. According to a lawsuit filed in federal court by Floridians Protecting Freedom on Wednesday, the woman would not have met the requirements for an exception because an abortion only would have “extend[ed]” her life, not saved it. There are post-ban examples, too.

In another case, a 15-week pregnant woman was leaking amniotic fluid for an hour in a Broward County, Florida, hospital waiting room. Her ultrasound showed she had no amniotic fluid around her fetus, a condition that can quickly lead to serious infection and death. She was discharged and miscarried in a public restroom later that day, at which point was rushed to another hospital and put on a ventilator. She stayed in the hospital for six days.

“When you don’t want to talk about the fact that your state has an abortion ban that’s forced rape survivors to go out of state for care, that’s led to women almost losing their lives,” FPF campaign director Lauren Brenzel recently told Mother Jones, “you create distractions because you don’t want to talk about the harmful policy that you’ve implemented.” She added, “It’s not shocking. It’s the national playbook.”

Before Roe v. Wade was overturned in June 2022, abortions in Florida were available until 24 weeks of pregnancy; soon afterward, a 15-week ban became law. Still, Florida remained an essential abortion haven for the Southeast. Then, on May 1, a six-week ban took effect, and the impact was immediate and drastic—and not just in the state, new data from the Guttmacher Institute shows. Clinician-provided abortions plunged in Florida by more than 30 percent in May and June, to an average of about 5,400 abortions per month. In contrast, during the first three months of the year, the state averaged about 8,000 abortions every month. 

“Our data paint a vivid picture of the chaos and confusion caused by Florida’s six-week abortion ban,” Isaac Maddow-Zimet, a Guttmacher data scientist, said in a statement.

Nationally, the average number of abortions in May and June fell by more than 7 percent from the first three months of the year, according to Guttmacher’s Monthly Abortion Provision Study. More than a third of that drop is the direct consequence of the Florida ban, highlighting how important a role the state has played in abortion access throughout the South. In 2023, an estimated 9,000 out-of-state patients traveled to Florida to obtain an abortion, with the largest number of them coming from Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia—all states where draconian abortion laws have been put in place since the Dobbs decision. Before Florida imposed its own six-week ban, more than 1 in 10 abortions in the US happened there.  

The drop off in Florida abortions in May and June likely reflects reductions in access to abortion for patients from neighboring states with total or near-total bans of their own, as well as for state residents, Guttmacher says.

“Our data paint a vivid picture of the chaos and confusion caused by Florida’s six-week ban.”

The new report comes as reproductive rights advocates are pushing hard to pass an abortion rights ballot measure that would override Florida’s six-week ban. If approved in November, Amendment 4 would guarantee the right to abortion up to fetal viability—around 24 weeks gestation—or when necessary to protect the patient’s health. Supporters collected almost 1 million signatures to get the amendment on the ballot, making Florida one of 10 states with abortion measures in the fall. But to pass in the Sunshine State, the amendment must receive at least 60 percent of the vote, unlike in states such as Ohio, where a similar ballot initiative in 2023 only required a simple majority.  

As my colleague Julianne McShane has reported, the administration of Gov. Ron DeSantis seems to be doing everything it can to undermine the amendment, including launching a new website that attacks the initiative with “a litany of false claims.” These include that the measure “threatens women’s safety,” would “eliminate parental consent” for minors seeking abortions, and could “lead to unregulated and unsafe abortions” by allowing people without healthcare expertise to perform the procedure. Abortion rights groups have sued to block the misinformation campaign.

DeSantis officials have also been scrutinizing tens of thousands of petition signatures for evidence of fraud, even sending election police to the homes of some voters to verify their signatures. State officials certified the signatures in February, and the deadline for challenging them has passed. The ACLU of Florida has threatened to sue on behalf of the group leading the Yes on Amendment 4 effort, Floridians Protecting Freedom. Meanwhile, seven Florida congressional Democrats have written a letter asking US Attorney General Merrick Garland to investigate the DeSantis administration’s “brazen attempts at voter intimidation and election interference on Amendment 4,” the Florida Phoenix reported.

DeSantis signed the six-week ban in the spring of 2023, giving reproductive rights advocates in the state more than a year to prepare for the worst. The Florida Supreme Court upheld the ban this past April 1—the same day it also approved Amendment 4 to be on the November ballot. In April, abortions surged by 21 percent in the state. “Providers and patients went to great lengths to provide and access care, respectively, before the law went into effect,” on May 1, Guttmacher says. 

The Florida ban’s impact likely was also mitigated by the availability of medication abortion via telehealth from providers in states with abortion shield laws, Guttmacher notes. Telehealth abortions now account for nearly 1 in 5 abortions in the US.

But travel distances are adding additional burdens for abortion patients. If a Florida resident needs to have an abortion after six weeks of pregnancy, the closest clinic would be in North Carolina—which would require traveling an average distance of about 590 miles, Guttmacher says. Add to that, patients have to jump through numerous unnecessary hurdles to access care there—including in-person counseling 72 hours before obtaining an abortion. Since abortion is now banned in North Carolina after 12 weeks, many Florida residents are being forced to travel farther distances to states with fewer restrictions, including Virginia and Illinois, or to Puerto Rico. “Raising money for the cost of
the abortion, travel and lodging, missed wages, child-care costs, and more means that the difficulties of receiving needed abortion care are substantially increased and for some, insurmountable,” the Guttmacher report says.

According to new polling by The Hill and Emerson College, 55 percent of likely Florida voters support Amendment 4—a solid majority of the electorate but shy of the threshold needed to pass the measure. Another 20 percent of voters said they were “unsure.” Among the wafflers has been former President Donald Trump, who appeared to support the amendment in an interview with NBC News last month, triggering a ferocious backlash among the conservatives whose support he needs if he has any chance of beating Vice President Kamala Harris in November. The next day, Trump said he would vote against it, even as he told Fox News that he still thinks the six-week ban is too strict. 

The Florida government seems to be doing everything it can—including potentially breaking the law—to prevent voters from approving an abortion rights ballot measure in November.

On Thursday, the state’s health department debuted a webpage spreading misinformation about Amendment 4, a ballot measure appearing in November seeking to override the state’s six-week abortion ban that the Florida Supreme Court approved in April. If it receives the required 60 percent of votes to pass, the amendment would guarantee the right to abortion before the point of so-called fetal viability, which is generally understood to be around 24 weeks gestation. But the state’s new webpage—which DeSantis has since defended as a “public service announcement”—attacks the initiative with a litany of false claims, including that it “threatens women’s safety,” would “eliminate parental consent” for minors seeking abortions, and could “lead to unregulated and unsafe abortions” by allowing people without healthcare expertise to perform the procedure.

Those claims, though, are easily debunked by taking a look at the actual text of the amendment, which explicitly states that a patient’s healthcare provider is responsible for determining when an abortion after viability is necessary to protect a patient’s health. It also says that passage of the amendment would not override the authority of the legislature to require that a minor’s parent or guardian is notified before they obtain an abortion.

But the state’s campaign against the amendment doesn’t stop there. On the same day of the site’s launch, the Tampa Bay Times reported that the Florida Department of State was looking for evidence of fraud in the more than 30,000 citizen signatures used to get the amendment on the November ballot. Two election supervisors told the paper that the move was “highly unusual” given that the signatures had already been approved by local supervisors. The Tampa Bay Times also reported Friday that police had visited the homes of at least two voters who had signed the petition supporting Amendment 4 seeking to verify their signatures.

The anti-abortion efforts are the latest in Gov. Ron DeSantis‘ ongoing fight to defeat Amendment 4 after launching a political spending committee aimed at doing just that in May. (It has raised $3.7 million to date.) Now abortion rights advocates say DeSantis’ government is hoping to scare voters into voting against the amendment. “To our knowledge, it is unprecedented for the State to expressly advocate against a citizen-led initiative,” Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, said Thursday. “This kind of propaganda issued by the state, using taxpayer money and operating outside of the political process sets a dangerous precedent.”

On Friday, the Florida Democratic Party said in a statement that it had submitted a public records request seeking information on when the agency started working on the webpage and who was involved. “Ron [DeSantis] and his buddies know they’re losing, and they’re willing to do anything—including breaking the law—to rig the results in their favor,” Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried said in a statement, adding that the party is also pursuing legal action to try to have the page taken down. State Senate Democratic Leader Lauren Book also said her office was investigating legal action in response to the webpage.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration did not respond to questions from Mother Jones about how much the web page cost to establish and maintain, who demanded its creation, why it includes false and misleading information, and how officials respond to criticism about the site. Instead, the agency provided the following statement: “Part of the Agency’s mission is to provide information and transparency to Floridians on the quality of care they receive. Our new transparency page serves to educate Floridians on the state’s current abortion laws and provide information on a proposed policy change that would impact care across the state.”

Now some have warned that the DeSantis administration’s use of government resources for political purposes could be illegal. Meanwhile, polling suggests the majority of Florida voters support the amendment.

The Florida government seems to be doing everything it can—including potentially breaking the law—to prevent voters from approving an abortion rights ballot measure in November.

On Thursday, the state’s health department debuted a webpage spreading misinformation about Amendment 4, a ballot measure appearing in November seeking to override the state’s six-week abortion ban that the Florida Supreme Court approved in April. If it receives the required 60 percent of votes to pass, the amendment would guarantee the right to abortion before the point of so-called fetal viability, which is generally understood to be around 24 weeks gestation. But the state’s new webpage—which DeSantis has since defended as a “public service announcement”—attacks the initiative with a litany of false claims, including that it “threatens women’s safety,” would “eliminate parental consent” for minors seeking abortions, and could “lead to unregulated and unsafe abortions” by allowing people without healthcare expertise to perform the procedure.

Those claims, though, are easily debunked by taking a look at the actual text of the amendment, which explicitly states that a patient’s healthcare provider is responsible for determining when an abortion after viability is necessary to protect a patient’s health. It also says that passage of the amendment would not override the authority of the legislature to require that a minor’s parent or guardian is notified before they obtain an abortion.

But the state’s campaign against the amendment doesn’t stop there. On the same day of the site’s launch, the Tampa Bay Times reported that the Florida Department of State was looking for evidence of fraud in the more than 30,000 citizen signatures used to get the amendment on the November ballot. Two election supervisors told the paper that the move was “highly unusual” given that the signatures had already been approved by local supervisors. The Tampa Bay Times also reported Friday that police had visited the homes of at least two voters who had signed the petition supporting Amendment 4 seeking to verify their signatures.

The anti-abortion efforts are the latest in Gov. Ron DeSantis‘ ongoing fight to defeat Amendment 4 after launching a political spending committee aimed at doing just that in May. (It has raised $3.7 million to date.) Now abortion rights advocates say DeSantis’ government is hoping to scare voters into voting against the amendment. “To our knowledge, it is unprecedented for the State to expressly advocate against a citizen-led initiative,” Bacardi Jackson, executive director of the ACLU of Florida, said Thursday. “This kind of propaganda issued by the state, using taxpayer money and operating outside of the political process sets a dangerous precedent.”

On Friday, the Florida Democratic Party said in a statement that it had submitted a public records request seeking information on when the agency started working on the webpage and who was involved. “Ron [DeSantis] and his buddies know they’re losing, and they’re willing to do anything—including breaking the law—to rig the results in their favor,” Florida Democratic Party Chair Nikki Fried said in a statement, adding that the party is also pursuing legal action to try to have the page taken down. State Senate Democratic Leader Lauren Book also said her office was investigating legal action in response to the webpage.

The Florida Agency for Health Care Administration did not respond to questions from Mother Jones about how much the web page cost to establish and maintain, who demanded its creation, why it includes false and misleading information, and how officials respond to criticism about the site. Instead, the agency provided the following statement: “Part of the Agency’s mission is to provide information and transparency to Floridians on the quality of care they receive. Our new transparency page serves to educate Floridians on the state’s current abortion laws and provide information on a proposed policy change that would impact care across the state.”

Now some have warned that the DeSantis administration’s use of government resources for political purposes could be illegal. Meanwhile, polling suggests the majority of Florida voters support the amendment.