On August 8, a Leon County, Florida, circuit court rejected a lawsuit that had been filed to keep three State Supreme Court Justices off the retention ballot. In Florida, justices of the Supreme Court must actually file to appear on the ballot, even though they don’t run in candidate elections; instead their names are listed on the ballot and voters vote on whether to retain them.

The lawsuit had been filed by voters who charged that the ballot access applications were flawed. The law requires such applications to be notarized. The justices filed at the last minute, and in their rush, they had their applications notarized by employees of the Supreme Court. A law says court employees can’t work for a candidate on government time. But the court ruled that, whatever the merits of that argument, the plaintiffs lack standing. See this story. It would be a rare lower court judge who would rule that three members of that state’s Supreme Court justices must be removed from the ballot.