Judge Thomas Wingate of the Franklin Circuit Court in Kentucky on Monday denied secretary of state candidate Carl Neff’s request to appear on the 2019 Primary Election ballot under the nickname “Trump,” saying it would give an unfair advantage.

The decision upholds Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes’ position that Neff offered the nickname “in an improper attempt to gain an advantage on the ballot.” Neff argued that not allowing him to appear as “Carl ‘Trump!’ Neff” on the ballot denies him “freedom from absolute and arbitrary power over an individual.”

Neff apparently got the nickname in 2015, “after members of the Jefferson County Republican Party began calling him ‘Trump’ for his insistence that materials for then-candidate Donald Trump be displayed at its booth at the Kentucky State Fair.”

Under Kentucky law, a candidate’s nickname may appear on the ballot, so long as certain criterion set forth by the Secretary of State is met:

[A nickname] shall be placed on the ballot only if it is the candidate’s bona fide nickname, generally used by acquaintances of the candidate in the county of residence to refer to the candidate, and if the nickname is acknowledged, by affidavit, under oath, by five (5) residents of the county in which the candidate resides, to be a bona fide nickname. The candidate shall also acknowledge, by affidavit under oath, that this is his bona fide nickname and is not being used to gain an advantage on the ballot.”

Wingate denied Neff’s request for injunctive relief, saying Grimes did not abuse her power in denying Neff’s nickname request. “A bona fide nickname is one by which members of the community use as an active form of recognition of an individual.” The ruling relies on several pieces of persuasive evidence, such as the fact that the “nickname has not appeared on any branding literature that is available in the public,” and Neff “only used the nickname ‘Trump’ on one of his campaign related materials, a fundraising letter that was mailed to individuals who he addressed as ‘Dear fellow Trump supporter.'”