The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure states that "The court may strike from a pleading an insufficient defense or any redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter." Similarly, for example, the California Code of Civil Procedure provides that a motion to strike may be made to strike out any "irrelevant, ...
A motion to strike a defense under Rule 1.140(b) must be brought within 20 days after service of the pleading.
Affirmative defenses must be timely filed in the pleadings, or the right to assert them may be waived. POL; Court Opinions. If a defendant elects to file a pre-answer motion to dismiss, affirmative defenses may be raised at that point.
A party may move for summary judgment at any time after the expiration of 20 days from the commencement of the action or after service of a motion for summary judgment by the adverse party. The movant must serve the motion for summary judgment at least 40 days before the time fixed for the hearing.
Per Rule 1.110(d), attorneys must now provide a clear and concise statement of ultimate facts when asserting affirmative defenses. Prior to this amendment, a defendant's affirmative defenses did not have to be pled with supporting factual evidence, and had the ability to be more broad.
A “motion to dismiss” is typically filed in response to a complaint and is made in lieu of filing an “answer.” Technically, a plaintiff can move to “strike” a defense that a defendant has pled, given that defenses are subject to the same pleading requirements as are the plaintiff's claims.
(f) Motion to Strike. A party may move to strike or the court may strike redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter from any pleading at any time.
Rule 12.260 - SURVIVOR; SUBSTITUTION OF PARTIES (a) Death. (1) If a party dies and the claim is not thereby extinguished, the court may order substitution of the proper parties.
What happens next? If we filed the motion to strike in a trial court, then we will set the motion to be heard by a judge or magistrate, and be ruled upon. If we filed it in an appeals court, the appeals court will read the motion and offending document and will rule on it without hearing.