Rule 1.421.Defenses; how raised; consolidation; waiver

Rule 1.421(1) sets the baseline: every defense must be asserted in the responsive pleading, or in an amendment to the answer filed within 20 days after the answer was served, or at trial if no responsive pleading is required. But six defenses can instead be raised by a pre-answer motion: lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, lack of personal jurisdiction, insufficiency of the original notice or its service, a motion to recast or strike, a motion for a more specific statement, and failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.

The rule then tightens the screws on how those motions must be filed. Improper venue under Rule 1.808 has to be raised by pre-answer motion filed before, or combined with, the single motion Rule 1.421(3) requires. That subrule is the consolidation rule: if the grounds for more than one of the pre-answer-motion defenses other than lack of subject-matter jurisdiction already exist when a party makes such a motion, all of them must go into one motion — only one such motion attacking the same pleading is allowed, unless the pleading is later amended. Leave a defense out of that motion and it's waived, with two exceptions the rule carves out for good reason: lack of subject-matter jurisdiction and failure to state a claim survive no matter when they're raised, because a court without jurisdiction can't proceed at all, and a claim with no legal basis shouldn't survive on a technicality.

Rule 1.421 also addresses a separate situation: the sufficiency of a defense already pleaded — for instance, an affirmative defense in an Answer — can be challenged by a motion to strike, filed before the challenging party pleads to it. And any motion under this rule must specify exactly how the pleading it attacks is claimed to be insufficient, not just assert insufficiency in the abstract.