On May 9, Florida State Senator Jason Pizzo, who is an independent, said he will run for Governor next year. See this story.

He can get on the November 2026 ballot simply by paying a filing fee. Florida elimated mandatory ballot access petitions (except for independent presidential candidates) in 1998, by a vote of the people. Previously, he would have needed a petition of 3% of the registered voters, which nowadays would be over 400,000 signatures.

Florida puts the nominees of major parties at the top of the ballot, followed by minor party nominees, and independent candidates are listed last. Independent candidates in Florida have the ballot label “NPA”.

The last time Florida elected a Governor who was neither a Democratic nor a Republican nominee was 1916, when the Prohibition Party nominee, Sidney J.. Catts, won. Back then Florida didn’t print party labels on the general election ballot.

On May 8, fifteen states filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court in Libby v Fecteau, 24A1051. This is the case filed by a Maine legislator to restore her right to vote on bills on the floor of the State House of Representatives. The states are Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Montana, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia.

The brief argues that the doctrine of legislative immunity does not apply because depriving a member of the legislature of her ability to vote on bills is not a normal legislative function. The brief refers to the 1920 instance when the New York legislature expelled all elected Socialist Party members. It quotes Charles Evans Hughes as saying that action was wrong. Hughes was Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, and he had also been the Republican nominee for President in 1916.

On May 8, former U.S. Supreme Court Justice David Souter died. He had written Norman v Reed, the last U.S. Supreme Court opinion that helped ballot access. The 1992 decision interpreted several Illinois ballot access laws in a favorable manner, and was a victory for the Harold Washington Party in its battle to appear on the Cook County ballot for county office. On the other hand, a few months later, Souter voted to uphold Hawaii’s ban on write-in votes.