LAKE COUNTY, Fla. – Florida’s resign-to-run law is being put to the test in Lake County.
District 1 Lake County Commissioner Anthony Sabatini is refusing to resign from his seat in order to run for U.S. House District 11.
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He’s suing the state in federal court, claiming it violates the Qualifications Clause and the Elections Clause of the United States Constitution.
U.S. Judge Mark Walker denied Sabatini’s request for an injunction against the law last week, saying he wasn’t convinced the sole purpose of the law was to create an extra requirement to run for Congress.
But Sabatini has amended and refiled his motion. He’s asking the judge to hurry, too — the candidate qualifying period starts at noon on Monday, June 8, and runs through noon on Friday, June 12.
If Sabatini does not get his injunction or submit a letter of resignation before the end of qualifying, the law says it will trigger an “automatic irrevocable resignation.”
But Sabatini told News 6 over the phone on Thursday that the law is “highly illegal.”
What the law says
According to the Resign to Run law, all candidates for federal office who are already state or local officials are supposed to submit a letter of resignation 10 days before the start of the candidate qualifying period (which, again, is June 8).
That doesn’t mean Sabatini would have to resign immediately, though. He can choose to make his official resignation date the day he takes his seat in the U.S. House, or the day his replacement in the Lake County Commission is due to take office.
However, if no resignation letter is submitted by the end of the candidate qualifying period, it, according to the law, “constitutes an automatic irrevocable resignation, effective immediately, from the office he or she presently holds.”
The law says the Department of State will send the notice of automatic resignation to the governor.
Either way, once the resignation takes effect, the governor is the one who appoints Sabatini’s replacement to serve on the Lake County Commission until 2028.
What Sabatini says
Sabatini was elected to the District 1 seat on the Lake County Commission in 2024, and his term is not up until 2028.
He’s running to replace retiring Congressman Dan Webster in U.S. House District 11. But first, he has to get through a Republican primary in August with five other GOP candidates.
Sabatini feels that, should he lose in August or in November, he should be able to continue serving on the commission until the end of his term. The law prevents that from happening.
His lawsuit calls the Resign to Run law “an impermissible scheme to impose an additional qualification on a candidate for the United States House of Representatives.”
“The United States Constitution sets the exclusive qualifications for Members of the United States House of Representatives: age, citizenship, and inhabitancy.... A state may not add to, subtract from, evade, or indirectly supplement those qualifications by imposing a state-law prerequisite to federal congressional candidacy,” the lawsuit reads.
Sabatini’s amended injunction request said the law forces him to decide whether to give up his current elected office or give up his Congressional run. He says that choice is a potential barrier to his candidacy.
Sabatini told News 6 he is confident his amended injunction request will be granted.
However, even if it’s not, he questions whether the state can actually force him to resign.
We’ll see what the state does after qualifying ends.
[READ the amended complaint]