Florida Supreme Court rules Miami attorney failed to properly qualify for state senate seat

A Miami attorney's attempt to be placed on the ballot for a South Florida state Senate race was rejected by the Florida Supreme Court on Tuesday evening.

Francisco Amador had filed suit directly with the state high court in July, a month after Florida Division of Elections officials didn't accept his paperwork to qualify for the District 34 seat as a no-party-affiliation candidate. Election officials said he didn't pay his qualifying fee from a primary campaign account, which is required under state law.

A unanimous court determined Amador's method of paying the qualifying fee violated state law, and the state was correct to keep him off the ballot.

"Amador attempted to pay his qualifying fee in a manner that Florida law does not permit," Justice John Couriel wrote in his four-page ruling. "And he did not correct his error before the end of the statutory qualifying period.  Under these circumstances, Amador does not have a clear legal right to be recognized as a qualified candidate."

The crux of Amador's lawsuit centered on his attempt to pay his qualifying fee. He initially set up two campaign accounts, with Space Coast Credit Union and with Bank of America, in his qualifying paperwork filed with the state on June 10. But he had not paid his qualifying fee yet, and the June 12 deadline to qualify was approaching.

Then, Amador stated in court filings, Space Coast Credit Union informed him it doesn't offer political campaign accounts. That left him to draw the qualifying fee check on the Bank of America account.

But state election officials rejected the check because it wasn't from the "primary campaign account" he had earlier listed as being the Space Coast Credit Union account.

Amador argued state officials only play a "ministerial" role in administering elections, and they should have allowed him to get on the ballot.

In the ruling, though, the court dismissed that argument, deciding that while state law allows for a "secondary depository" to be used by a candidate, the "primary depository" must be used to draw a check for the qualifying fee. According to the ruling, under state law, a secondary campaign account can only be used to receive donations and forward them to the primary campaign account.

"Given this express restriction, a check drawn from an account in a secondary campaign depository cannot be used to pay a qualifying fee," Couriel wrote.

For no-party-affiliation candidates for the Legislature, the qualifying fee this year was $1,187.88. Candidates are also able to forgo the fee by gathering a certain number of petition signatures. For District 34, that was 2,987 signatures this year.

District 34 covers a section of northeastern Miami-Dade County that includes all or part of Miami Gardens, Opa-Locka, North Miami and Surfside.

Incumbent Sen. Shevrin Jones, D-Miami Gardens, is leaving the seat to run for Congress.

The candidates who did qualify for the District 34 ballot include three Democrats - state Rep. Ashley Gantt, Shannan Ighodaro, and Christine Sanon-Jules Olivo – and one Republican – Elizabeth Jeanty.