A motion to strike affirmative defenses in Florida is filed under Rule 1.140 of the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure and asks the court to remove defenses that are legally insufficient, factually bare, or immaterial to the claims in the case. Since July 1, 2024, an amendment to Rule 1.110(d) requires defendants to plead the ultimate facts supporting every affirmative defense, which has made these motions considerably harder to defeat. If you are the plaintiff staring at an answer stuffed with one-line defenses, the rule is now on your side.
The Two Grounds Under Rule 1.140 and Their Deadlines
Rule 1.140 gives you two separate paths, and most motions use both.
The first is the sufficiency challenge. An objection that an affirmative defense fails to state a legally sufficient defense must be raised by motion to strike within 20 days after service of the answer or reply containing it.1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure Miss that window and you lose the procedural shortcut; you can still attack the defense later, but you will have to do it through summary judgment on a factual record.
The second is Rule 1.140(f), which lets any party move at any time to strike “redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter” from a pleading.1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure Immaterial means the defense has no bearing on the issues in the complaint; impertinent means it reaches beyond what is needed to address the claims. There is no fixed deadline, but waiting invites an argument that you waived the point by conducting discovery on the defense without complaint.
Filing on both grounds is the norm. You argue the defense is legally insufficient, and in the alternative that its allegations are immaterial or impertinent.
What the 2024 Amendment Changed
Effective July 1, 2024, the Florida Supreme Court amended Rule 1.110(d) to require that every affirmative defense contain “a short and plain statement of the ultimate facts supporting the avoidance or affirmative defense.”2Supreme Court of Florida. Amendments to the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure – SC2022-1719 Before the amendment, defendants routinely asserted defenses with nothing more than a label and a legal conclusion. That no longer suffices.
A defense that says “Plaintiff’s claims are barred by the statute of limitations” without identifying which statute, when the clock started, or why the claim is untimely is now facially deficient. The defendant must plead actual facts. Boilerplate defenses that survived under the old regime are strong candidates for a motion to strike under the amended rule.
The amendment also matters because Rule 1.110(d) enumerates the recognized affirmative defenses.2Supreme Court of Florida. Amendments to the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure – SC2022-1719 If the defendant has labeled something an affirmative defense but it is neither on that list nor functions as a true avoidance, that alone is grounds to strike.
What Makes a Defense Strikable
Courts ask two questions: is this defense legally valid, and is it pled with enough factual detail?
Legal Sufficiency
A defense is legally insufficient when it would not bar or reduce recovery even if every fact alleged were true. Comparative negligence pled against a straight breach-of-contract claim is the textbook example. The defense does not fit the cause of action, so no factual development can save it.
Courts also strike defenses that are really denials in disguise. “Plaintiff failed to state a cause of action” and “Defendant denies liability” raise no new facts that would avoid the claim, and they do not shift any burden. They are not affirmative defenses at all.
Factual Sufficiency
Even a legally valid defense will fall if it lacks the factual detail Rule 1.110(d) now requires. Fair notice does not demand the depth of a complaint, but it does demand enough specificity that the plaintiff can understand the factual basis and respond.2Supreme Court of Florida. Amendments to the Florida Rules of Civil Procedure – SC2022-1719
Fraud and Mistake Get a Higher Bar
Rule 1.120(b) requires the circumstances of alleged fraud or mistake to be stated with as much specificity as the situation permits.1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure A fraudulent inducement defense should identify who made the misrepresentation, what was said, when it was said, and why it was material. Vague fraud allegations are routinely stricken.
What the Court Will and Won’t Look At
A motion to strike is decided on the face of the pleading. The judge does not hear testimony, review affidavits, or consider evidence outside the four corners of the answer. This cuts both ways. You cannot introduce proof that the defense is factually wrong, and the defendant cannot rescue a threadbare defense by pointing to evidence that the facts exist.
Florida courts do not strike defenses just because the judge suspects the defendant cannot prove them at trial. The question at this stage is whether the defense as written states a recognized defense supported by sufficient facts. If your real objection is that the defense is false rather than deficient, the motion to strike is the wrong tool. That fight belongs at summary judgment or trial.
Drafting the Motion
Address each challenged defense individually, by number, with the specific ground for striking it. A blanket request to strike every affirmative defense without particularized argument tends to lose and can annoy the court.
For each defense, match your argument to the standard that fits:
- If the defense does not apply to the cause of action or is not recognized under Florida law, explain why it is legally invalid.
- If the defense is a legal label without ultimate facts, point to the specific gaps and cite the amended Rule 1.110(d).
- If the allegations have no connection to the claims, argue they are immaterial or impertinent under Rule 1.140(f).
Watch both deadlines. Sufficiency challenges go within 20 days of the answer. Rule 1.140(f) challenges have no fixed deadline, but move promptly.1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure
The Hearing and What Comes After
Hearings are short, usually 15 to 30 minutes unless the motion challenges many defenses one by one. Both sides argue from the pleading; there are no witnesses. You walk the court through each defense and explain the deficiency. The defendant responds and often asks for leave to amend.
Judges have real discretion, and Florida courts prefer to resolve disputes on the merits. A defense that barely clears the pleading standard usually survives. Where judges push back is on shotgun answers that assert every conceivable defense with no factual tie to the case, and the 2024 amendment gave them clearer authority to demand that tie.
Leave to Amend
When the court strikes a defense, it must decide whether to grant leave to amend. Rule 1.190(a) says leave “shall be given freely when justice so requires.”1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure A first-time pleading deficiency almost always gets a second chance, typically 10 or 20 days to file a corrected answer.
Leave is not automatic. If the defense is legally inapplicable to the claims, no additional facts will cure it and the court can strike with prejudice as futile. The same result follows when a defendant has already had one or more amendments and keeps refiling the same defective defense. If leave is granted, the defendant attaches the proposed amended answer to the motion to amend, and you can move to strike again if the amendment still falls short.1The Florida Bar. Florida Rules of Civil Procedure
Adding a Sanctions Motion Under Section 57.105
When defenses are not just poorly pled but baseless, Section 57.105 of the Florida Statutes lets you recover attorney’s fees. The court must award reasonable fees when a defense was not supported by the material facts necessary to establish it, or when existing law would not support the defense given those facts. Fees are split equally between the losing party and the losing party’s attorney, so both have a personal stake. Monetary sanctions cannot be imposed on a represented party for a defense that fails on legal grounds if the defense was presented as a good-faith argument to change existing law.3Justia Law. Florida Code Title VI Chapter 57 – Section 57.105
The statute has a 21-day safe harbor. You serve the sanctions motion on opposing counsel and wait 21 days before filing it with the court, giving the other side a chance to withdraw or correct the challenged defense.3Justia Law. Florida Code Title VI Chapter 57 – Section 57.105 Many defendants use that window to withdraw their weakest defenses rather than risk a fee award. The motion to strike and the 57.105 motion serve different purposes and can travel together: one removes the defense, the other recovers what you spent dealing with it.
What a Win Actually Changes
Defenses stricken with prejudice are gone. The defendant cannot raise them at trial or use them for settlement leverage, and discovery aimed at them can be cut off. In a case where the answer asserted a dozen boilerplate defenses, striking most of them narrows the litigation from a sprawling fight to a focused one.
When defenses are stricken with leave to amend, the practical effect depends on whether the defendant can actually plead facts that fix the problem. If the defense is legally inapplicable, no amendment will help and it should not come back. If the flaw was only thin pleading, the amended version may be sharper.
A denial is not the end. Defenses that survive a motion to strike often become summary judgment targets once discovery fills in the record, because at that stage the court can consider evidence rather than just the pleading.