Jacob Ogles
The Florida Department of State notified Rep. Debbie Mayfield that the state will not permit her to run as a candidate for Senate.
The Brevard Republican announced in November that she would run in a Special Election for her old seat in Senate District 19, shortly after Sen. Randy Fine announced he would resign to run for Congress.
Mayfield has vowed to fight the latest decision.
“Today, Governor (Ron) DeSantis used the executive branch to punish me for endorsing Donald J. Trump for President,” she said in a statement “He has weaponized the Department of State just like Joe Biden weaponized the Department of Justice against Donald Trump. The law is on my side. We will fight for the people of Brevard on this just like I have always done.”
A letter sent to Mayfield’s campaign cites Florida’s term limits law. Mayfield previously served in the Senate from 2016 to 2024 and could not run for re-election in November because of term limits.
The message from Division of Elections Director Maria Matthews states that Mayfield’s candidacy now would violate the Constitution because a person cannot run for Florida Senator “if, by the end of the current term of office, the person will have served (or but for resignation, would have served) in that office for eight consecutive years.”
A Republican insider said the party has maintained a concern Mayfield’s candidacy could be challenged in court, and that she could be booted even after an April 1 Republican Primary, leaving the party on poor footing for a June 10 Special Election in what should be a safe Republican seat.
A constitutional amendment passed by Florida voters in 1992 prohibits incumbents who have held an office for eight consecutive years from running for re-election. But the language appearing on the ballot that year, according to Ballotpedia, specifically addressed “incumbents who have held the same elective office for the preceding eight years.”
Historically, the state has not forbade officials from running for the same office again after a period out of office.
Republican consultants have said case law shows even a short break from office resets the clock as far as term limits are concerned. When an election challenge delayed the seating of former Rep. Jamie Grant following his 2014 re-election, he was eventually seated without his prior service being counted against his term limits.
The interpretation seems to suggest once an elected serves in a legislative office for eight years, they cannot ever run for the post again. That’s a break in precedent from more than three decades of interpretation of the law. Even Mayfield’s election to the House last year marked a return to the lower chamber after previously serving in the Florida House from 2008 through 2016.
But Florida’s State Department is taking a different position. Of note, Mayfield previously endorsed Gov. Ron DeSantis for President, but changed her endorsement ahead of the Iowa caucuses to support President Donald Trump instead. Trump in turn endorsed her run for House last year.
Mayfield was running for her old Senate seat less than a year after leaving it. She won election in House District 32 last year, but already submitted her resignation to run for the Senate seat, as required by state law. DeSantis already called a Special Election for Mayfield’s House seat to unfold concurrently with the election for the SD 19 seat.
Some political consultants expressed surprise the Secretary of State’s Office was making a legal interpretation of the constitution at all, rather than waiting for a legal challenge to land the issue in front of a judge.
“I thought the Secretary of State’s duty was secretarial not legal,” said consultant Anthony Pedicini, who is not working for any candidate in the SD 19 race.
Democratic consultant Matt Isbell similar took issue with the State Department making such a decision at the qualification stage.
“If this is truly for the term limit argument, it is a dangerous precedent,” he posted on X. “The SOS rejecting filings because of their interpretation of constitutional qualifications (which they have said is not their role in the past). Oh can that be abused against whoever Ron hates.”
The qualification deadline for SD 19 passed at noon on Tuesday, but the Division of Elections took an unusually long time in updating its website to say if candidates qualified. This sparked speculation among consultants about whether the state was intentionally slowing the qualification process down.
That’s especially consequential as the qualification deadline for the Special Election to fill Mayfield’s HD 32 seat is at noon on Wednesday, just 24 hours after the deadline for SD 19. The notification means Mayfield can potentially file in the Special Election for the seat from which she has resigned.
The Division of Elections has also disqualified Gabriel Goddard, who filed for SD 19 on Tuesday and whose check payment was received one minute before the qualification deadline.
