{"id":354430,"date":"2026-07-28T01:27:22","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T01:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/354430\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T01:27:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T01:27:22","slug":"judge-rules-fishback-can-remain-on-ballot-in-florida-governors-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/354430\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge rules Fishback can remain on ballot in Florida governor\u2019s race"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCJB) \u2014 A Leon County circuit judge ruled Monday that Republican gubernatorial candidate James Fishback can remain on the ballot, pending a potential appeal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The ruling followed a hearing held last week in Tallahassee, where a judge heard evidence about Fishback\u2019s domicile.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Lt. Governor Jay Collins, also a Republican primary candidate, filed the lawsuit seeking to have Fishback removed from the ballot.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The central question at trial was whether <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wcjb.com\/2026\/07\/21\/live-hearing-begins-lawsuit-challenging-james-fishbacks-eligibility-governor\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.wcjb.com\/2026\/07\/21\/live-hearing-begins-lawsuit-challenging-james-fishbacks-eligibility-governor\/\">Fishback forfeited his Florida residency<\/a> when he voted in Washington, D.C., in 2020.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">With the ruling, Fishback remains a legal candidate for now, though the case could continue if Collins pursues an appeal.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIt\u2019s official. The disgraceful lawfare brought by Jay Collins and fueled by Byron Donalds has failed,\u201d stated James Fishback. \u201cThis isn\u2019t just a victory for our campaign. It\u2019s a victory for the Constitution and for every Floridian who believes elections should be decided by voters, not politicians trying to rig the system.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.wcjb.com\/newsletter\/\" title=\"\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Click here<\/a> to subscribe to our newsletter.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WCJB. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCJB) \u2014 A Leon County circuit judge ruled Monday that Republican gubernatorial candidate James Fishback can&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":354431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,34033,30,29,144769,144767,144768,112121],"class_list":["post-354430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-governor-race-2026","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-florida-residency-domicile-law","tag-james-fishback-ballot-ruling","tag-jay-collins-lawsuit","tag-leon-county-circuit-court"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354430","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=354430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/354430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/354431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=354430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=354430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=354430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}