Florida Democratic Party Lawsuit on Ballot Order

The Democratic Party’s lawsuit against the Florida law that always puts the party that won the last gubernatorial election first on the ballot is moving along. The experts who will testify that being listed first on the ballot gives candidates an advantage will present their reports on January 29. The state’s experts, who will presumably present evidence that ballot position doesn’t matter, will submit their reports on February 13. The trial will be June 3. The case is now called Jacobson v Ertel. It was formerly Jacobson v Detzner but Florida has a new Secretary of State.


Comments

Florida Democratic Party Lawsuit on Ballot Order — 9 Comments

  1. Given how many states order candidates in alphabetical order, the results of Browne, Badnarik, and Barr, (all coming first alphabetically in their respective runs for the White House) show how little advantage the top of the list gives.

  2. There aren’t many states that use candidate alphabetical order. There are more states that give every candidate an equal chance to be on top, via rotation or random selection.

  3. Way too late for SCOTUS in 2020 election ???

    ie — the conspiracy HACKS get past another election ??? Duh.

    half A to Z
    half Z to A

    too difficult for the MORON judges ???

  4. To be fair Shawn, along with not a lot of states actually doing it alphabetically in the first place, one would expect that for high profile races like president, governor, and senate, that this trend would seem to have less of an effect. It’s when you get down to state house and senate races, along with U.S. representative, where this comes into slightly more play

    Also, with primaries of the lesser party in a given jurisdiction (look at a mentally challenged Trump supporter winning a Democratic primary for U.S. House in Indiana district 3 in 2016, or Mark Clayton of Tennessee in 2012 or Alvin Greene in South Carolina). When there’s names no one recognizes on a ballot, the first name on the ballot is going to have an advantage, which sucks, as there’s no way around it, but true nonetheless.

  5. The state’s case seems weak if their argument is that ballot position doesn’t matter. So, why bother? They should at least argue that the party that won the last gubernatorial election has earned the right to be listed first.

  6. Unless they changed it, West Virginia goes by previous presidential candidate performance. Thus, for a brief time, the unqualified Constitution Party placed one spot higher than the Mountain (Green) Party in ballot order after Charles Obadiah “Chuck” Baldwin edged out Cynthia McKinney by 110 votes in 2008.

  7. With the now many govt areas and gerrymander areas there are LOTS of different ballot forms for 1 or more precincts —

    since regimes want to have only ONE ballot per voter.

    Result – often area/precinct errors – esp with gerrymander areas.

    Another reason for ALL mail ballots — perhaps multiple area ballots A to Z, Z to A

    — with larger PR legis districts – using govt area boundaries == fewer different ballot forms.

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