On November 13 and 14, the Florida Republican Party held a fund-raising event in Orlando. Earlier the party had passed rules saying only presidential candidates who appeared could be on the presidential primary ballot automatically. Those who did not appear had to pay a filing fee of $25,000, or else obtain signatures of 125 registered Republicans from each U.S. House district.

Fourteen Republican presidential candidates attended and will now be on the March 15, 2016 presidential primary ballot. No one has paid the filing fee or gathered the signatures.

Seven Republicans spoke on Friday, November 13, in this order: Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, Jeb Bush, Donald Trump, and Ben Carson.

Another seven Republicans spoke on Saturday, November 14, in this order: Rick Santorum, Jim Gilmore, Bobby Jindal, Rand Paul, Chris Christie, John Kasich, and Carly Fiorina. Because the Paris attacks had occurred between the Friday session and the Saturday session, the Saturday speakers had an opportunity to address the Paris events.

Ben Carson had been the last presidential candidate to accept the invitation to attend the Sunshine Summit. He didn’t announce that he would attend until November 4.

The Florida Republican presidential primary is winner-take-all. Whoever gets the most votes on March 15 gets all the delegates. Never before has any Florida Republican presidential primary had more than nine candidates listed. However, it is unlikely that anyone will claim the Republican voters will be “confused” by using a ballot with 14 names.

There are two lawsuits pending aiming to expand who can be invited into the general election presidential debates. The one that was filed first is Level the Playing Field v Federal Election Commission, 1:15cv-1397. On November 9, the FEC answered the Complaint. On November 23, both sides will let the judge know their ideas for a briefing schedule.

On November 6, independent candidate Mark Moore asked the 8th circuit to reverse the decision of the U.S. District Court that upheld Arkansas’s non-presidential independent candidate petition deadline. Arkansas law says independent candidate petitions (for office other than President) are due on the same day that major party candidates file a declaration of candidacy to run in a primary. The U.S. District Court decision said early deadlines are only unconstitutional if the number of signatures is very large. However, this conclusion is plainly wrong, because in Anderson v Celebrezze, the U.S. Supreme Court said early petition deadlines are unconstitutional regardless of the number of signatures. In Anderson v Celebrezze, the number of signatures was less than one-tenth of 1% of the number of registered voters in Ohio at the time.

The case is Moore v Martin, 15-3558.