Carolina Forward Indicts the NC Judiciary

 

A powerful and necessary reality check on just how partisan and corrupted by power politics the North Carolina judiciary has become, laid bare in this instance by the RFK Jr. legal saga of getting on and then getting off the November ballot. An unsigned posting on Carolina Forward succinctly lays out the indictment of our highest courts:

From beginning to end, the sordid affair of the Kennedy campaign in North Carolina revealed just how weak the rule of law has become in our state, compared to the raw exercise of partisan political power.

Robert Kennedy Jr. was allowed, in multiple instances, to evade, ignore and manipulate North Carolina state law, and was permitted to do so by Republican political actors – specifically judges – seeking to give Donald Trump an electoral boost. The laws of the State of North Carolina had very little impact on what the Kennedy campaign did; only the whims of opinion polling made a difference. That is not a sound system of election administration. While the NC State Board of Elections generally made the correct calls under the law, our state’s politicized judicial system failed to uphold the supremacy of those laws, and opted instead for their own circumstantial partisan interest.

We don’t know yet who will win in November. But at least in this case, the people of North Carolina lost.

 

The Republican Judges Are Hiding

 

The Court of Appeals ruling that delayed the mailing of absentee ballots in North Carolina, because RFK Jr., who had fought like hell to get on the ballot and is now fighting like hell to get off the ballot to please Donald Trump, was signed only by the clerk of the court. The names of the three judges who reached this unprecedented decision have been hidden:

The names of Court of Appeals judges ruling on petitions are confidential for 90 days, according to the clerk of court, so they won’t become public before the election. (NandO)

They're so proud of their dispensing of justice!

Is this not more evidence of judicial corruption? Or let's be charitable and call it outright hyper partisanship wearing black robes.

The 3-Judge Panel in Cooper v. Berger (2023)

 

Gov. Roy Cooper sued (Cooper v. Berger, redux) October 10th, minutes after the Republican super-majority in the General Assembly successfully overrode his veto of a bill (S 512, a regular horror show of an omnibus) wherein Berger-Moore stripped the governor of power to appoint members of important boards and commissions (a bunch of them that guard public policy, including the N.C. Utilities Commission, which sets electricity rates, and the Board of Transportation, and the Environmental Management Commission, which sets pollution standards for businesses), and gave that power to themselves, to Berger-Moore personally (no kidding), thus creating a whole new level of political patronage and the wide-eyed expectation that corruption will surely follow. Cooper filed for an injunction to block implementation of Senate Bill 512 (and House Bill 488) "while their constitutionality is argued." 

A 3-judge panel

According to the new highly partisan court system Berger-Moore have set up, Chief Justice Paul Newby gets to pick the three-judge panel that will decide the constitutionality of the lege's taking so blatantly the administrative powers of the gov. The pool of superior court judges to hear such cases is now also appointed by Berger-Moore. It's wholesale power-grabbing. 

For hearing and ruling on this case, Newby chose Superior Court justices John Dunlow, Paul Holcombe, and Dawn Layton. They were scheduled to hear the case in Wake County this very day, starting at 10 a.m. 

John M. Dunlow (Republican), a superior court judge for Judicial District 9 in Granville County. His current term ends on December 31, 2026. He was a founding partner in Dunlow & Wilkinson, P.A., in Oxford, NC. He has a B.S. from AppState in poly sci and a J.D. from Campbell.

Paul A. Holcombe III (Republican), Resident Superior Court Judge for Johnston County in Smithfield, NC. Proud member of The Federalist Society. He got his J.D. at the University of Tennessee and worked as an assistant D.A. in Tennessee for some eight years before moving to North Carolina and taking the asst. D.A. route again, rising quickly to District Judge and then Superior Court Judge.

Dawn Layton (Democrat), superior court judge in Dist. 16A which includes Anson, Richmond, and Scotland counties. Appointed to the bench by Gov. Roy Cooper in 2019, she won in her own right in 2020 for an eight-year term. She's another one who learned her law in the assistant D.A. trenches, after getting her J.D. from Regent University School of Law in 2004.

 

Bad Non-Budget Provisions Slipped Into the Budget

Indebted to Billy Corriher for highlighting bad partisan provisions in the new proposed state budget (HB 259), the latest one, the new compromise that drops consideration of gambling and restores Medicaid expansion. But it is far from a "clean" bill, for it contains plenty of real doozie time-bombs that Billy Corriher noticed. And in coming days there will likely be additional hair-raising discoveries -- like this provision that Corriher highlighted on how the Judicial Standards Commission will be constituted:

Paul Newby

Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls is currently fending off this same commission, which says it's investigating her because she criticized the court for a lack of diversity. Supreme Court Chief Justice Paul Newby would get six appointments to the commission, hisownself, if you were wondering where the partisan advantage lay. Newby, operating on the high octane of self-righteousness, can be capable of purges. 

Billy Corriher predicts about this provision, "It’ll lead to more investigations of judges the GOP doesn’t like."

Corriher also points out that Paul Newby is specifically singled out for longevity in the budget bill: "[It] raises the retirement age for appellate judges. This’ll keep Paul Newby on the bench for a few more years, so he can continue to pack the Judicial Standards Commission to target Dem judges."

☻

Corriher: "The budget also allows lawmakers to pick 10 Superior Court judges for 8-year terms.... They’d control these judgeships forever, not the voters." Say what? Corriher supplies the evidence:

☻

Corriher: "The bill eliminates the right to appeal to the NC Supreme Court if there’s a dissent at the Court of Appeals."

 

Anita Earls Fights Back Against the Authoritarians

 

We have questions -- several unaswered questions -- about the news that WUNC broke yesterday afternoon about NC Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls ... that she is being investigated by the Judicial Standards Commission for comments she made to a legal news publication (what? where's a link?) that North Carolina's court system has a "poor track record on diversity and inclusion efforts." According to WUNC, she pointed out "a lack of diversity among judicial clerks and criticized the Supreme Court’s recent decision to disband its Commission on Fairness and Equity."

The Republicans on the Judicial Standards Commission, led by Court of Appeals judges Chris Dillon and Jeff Carpenter, have decided to be deeply offended by Earls' wholly accurate observations and have suggested that such comments by Earls is an unacceptable breach of judicial restraint. Dillon and Carpenter are looking into whether Earls violated confidentiality rules by making public comments "about matters before the court." They also question whether she violated a code of conduct that requires judges to promote "public confidence" in the integrity of the courts.

Apparently, the circus monkeys got on Earls' last nerve, for she has sued the commission to stop harassing her. "Her attorneys wrote that the commission is misinterpreting the code of conduct in an attempt to silence her." “The Commission’s actions in instituting the investigation indicate that it believes that ‘promot[ing] public confidence in the impartiality of the judiciary,’ is best accomplished by threatening judges who speak out about what they view as imperfections or defects in the judicial system and who do so in a measured and nuanced manner,” the lawsuit said. “Nothing could be more inimical to the First Amendment.”

Do You Smell Corruption When Tim Moore Is On the Premises?

 

Long story, short (with gratitude to Danielle Battaglia, of the NandO):

In 2022, House Speaker Tim Moore induced House Budget Chair Jason Saine to write in a new budgeted position for the courts system in the counties of Cleveland and Lincoln (the home counties of Tim Moore and Jason Saine, respectively), "trial court administrator," a new job which promptly went to a former employee of Moore's Kings Mountain law firm along with a $13,000 bump in salary.

The Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC) did not ask for the new position in their budget requests:

Only eight of North Carolina’s judicial districts have trial court administrators and they tend to have a high volume of cases. The others are Wake, Durham, Mecklenburg, Guilford, Forsyth and Cumberland counties and the district that encompasses Granville, Franklin, Person, Warren and Vance counties. 

Cleveland and Lincoln counties’ combined population of 193,765 is smaller than that of the other seven districts that have the position, whose populations range from 236,679 to 1.18 million.

Jason Saine

Tim Moore wouldn't speak to Battaglia about this news, but Jason Saine did speak in a way that might identify him as Moore's useful idiot and as a defense attorney's worst client. In trying to explain how a new high-salaried position got into the budget and how Tim Moore's close personal friend landed the job, Saine more or less defined "political corruption" for all of us:

“The local judges and court people were asking for it [a new trial court admin], and I realize AOC might not have requested it, but (the judges) are close to me and the speaker,” Saine said. “I don’t think it’s a big story; it’s just, yeah, turns out that’s how politics works: the proximity to talk to people who are in politics, and our districts do OK.”

We get it. Access = "doing OK."

Saine couldn't shut up:

“Tim interacts with the courthouse much more than I do,” Saine said, while struggling to explain who specifically requested the position. “It was one of those things that I was like OK, fine. That’s good with me. Whatever. They had a reason to justify it, and that was what it was.”

Asked why Cleveland or Lincoln received the positions while other counties were left without them, Saine responded: “Because I’m the budget writer and he’s the speaker. It goes into the budget for our areas and we’re able to see it through. It’s politics. I think readers would be shocked otherwise."

Not shocked any more by the obvious corruption, and by now only mildly annoyed that this sort of thing comes with zero consequences for any of the manipulators.

"They're Coming For Us"

A friend this past weekend said that to me, the title above, in reference to the recent wave of authoritarian crackdowns on obviously non-conforming people, not that she is being explicitly harassed and punished for certain classes of behavior that the conservative majority finds condemnable. But she intends to stand up for the minority, especially young women who need abortions, and she feels the grip of power closing tightly around even the ability to protest. Persecuted groups tend to be, all things considered, relatively powerless to resist. They can get loud. That's about it. But NC Republicans have a law for that too, H40, the so-called "anti-rioting bill" which is moving forward and which intends to chill the resistance to Republican overreach.

Phil Berger Jr.

New anti-abortion laws. Heckling of public school teachers and the restrictions on education (especially the education of history, understanding and empathy). New restraints on voting. The further gerrymanding of the political (and policy) map, along with the ten thousand hobbling ropes conservative regimes throw around the capering legs of the young.

On top of the legislative power we fear sits the judicial in North Carolina, especially the Supreme Court, swelling like a June thunderhead, because the Court has already signaled that it will be the most nakedly partisan Court in history. They seem intent on giving the General Assembly bosses a free hand for making conservative orthodoxy eternal. I learned from Gene Nichols that Supreme Court Justice Phil Berger Jr. recently appeared to gloat (boasted "giddily" in a court opinion, according to Nichols) about a news article which described “a lasting Republican grip on the Supreme Court.” The Death Grip.

Hell, as soon as Chief Justice Paul Newby got his Republican majority, in January (last month, y'all!), they used that 5-2 majority to order reconsiderations of recent court decisions from the Democratic era -- the case on voter photo I.D. and a gerrymandering case involving NC State Senate seats. While ordering rehearings, the five conservatives on the Court could point to no changed circumstance to justify the exceedingly rare decision to re-litigate recent Court decisions. The only plausible reason was their new crushing majority. The makeup of the Court changed, the numbers shifted, and they clearly intend to use their power to reverse and dismantle on purely partisan grounds.

Never before had this happened. Never. Taking legal revenge simply because the membership on the Court had changed. The essence of a destructive and oppressive partisanship. Which is, indeed, coming for us.

Allison Riggs Appointed to the NC Court of Appeals

 

The election of Court of Appeals Associate Justice Richard Dietz to the NC Supremes last month leaves a seat vacant on the Court of Appeals. It's not vacant any more.

Gov. Roy Cooper has appointed Allison Riggs to the seat. Riggs is co-executive director and voting rights chief counsel at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice (SCSJ).

Riggs’ voting rights work over the last nearly 15 years at SCSJ has been focused on fighting for fair redistricting plans, fighting against voter suppression, and advocating for electoral reforms that would expand access to voting.

She has litigated redistricting cases on behalf of State NAACP Conferences in Texas, Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina. In 2018, she argued a Texas redistricting case in the U.S. Supreme Court, and in 2019, she argued a North Carolina partisan gerrymandering case in the same high court. Most recently, she worked as lead counsel on the Moore v. Harper case, which was heard earlier this month in the U.S. Supreme Court. (Press release)

 

Jackson (D) v. Stading (R) for the NC Court of Appeals

 

PamsPicks evaluates the final statewide judge race.

NC Court of Appeals Judge, Seat 11

NOTE: You may vote for one. Candidates are presented below in the order they appear on your ballot.

Reason for my Endorsement: Decent man and fair Judge with a reliable progressive history v. Phil Berger’s Boy.

Darren Jackson, Democrat

https://www.judgedarrenjackson.com

https://www.facebook.com/JudgeDarrenJackson

https://twitter.com/intent/follow?screen_name=jacksonfornc

Jackson is running for a full 8-year term on the court after being appointed to this vacant seat in December of 2020. He’s a native of eastern Wake County. He rose to prominence in the NC House, where he was first elected to a Wake County seat in 2008 and was elevated to House Minority Leader in 2016. He was serving as Minority Leader when Gov. Cooper appointed him to the court.

Jackson earned his B.A. in political science from UNC-Chapel Hill in 1993 and got his law degree from Duke University and passed the bar in 1996. Jackson practiced law in Zebulon with Gay & Stroud. When Donna Stroud left to serve on the bench in 2004, the firm became Gay & Jackson. His small-town general practice focused on residential real estate and civil litigation.

After the disappointing performance of NC House Democratic candidates in the 2020 elections, Jackson announced that he would not be seeking to return to his minority leadership post: “I do take responsibility, of course, for us not picking up seats,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of leaders in our caucus, and it’s time to give somebody else a chance.”

Jackson’s endorsements include, among others, the North Carolina Association of Educators, the NC AFL-CIO, the North Carolina Association of Women Attorneys, North Carolina Advocates for Justice, The People’s Alliance, and the Sierra Club.

Michael J. Stading, Republican

https://www.michaelstading.com

https://www.facebook.com/michael.j.stading

https://mobile.twitter.com/michaeljstading

Stading is a former Mecklenburg County prosecutor and currently a district court judge. He served as a JAG officer for the Air Force and is still in the Air Force Reserve. He earned his degree from Campbell University Law School.

Stading has raised record amounts of money for a judgeship candidate, and he’s not been cautious about campaigning with Republican Senate candidate Ted Budd. Indeed, he’s been endorsed by some of the most conservative voices in the NCGOP, including jerk Congressman Dan Bishop and loose cannon Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson.

Stading says he’s “proud to be running for the Court of Appeals alongside #TheRightJudges,” and blows a consistent dog whistle of “uphold the Constitution, defend law & order, and protect American values.”

Even the ultra-conservative Daily Haymaker claimed (without explanation) that Stading is “a puppet for the Raleigh special interests.”What special interests was left unsaid.

Tyson (R) v. Adams (D), for the NC Court of Appeals

 

From PamsPicks, her next-to-last write-up of the all important, statewide Court of Appeals races. Republicans always have 10 of the 15 seats on this Court. Tyson is an incumbent.

NC Court of Appeals Judge, Seat 10

NOTE: You may vote for one. Candidates are presented below in the order they appear on your ballot.

Reason for my Endorsement: No Brainer: clearly progressive judicial candidate vs. volcanic conservative judicial candidate who is accused of trying to run over Black Lives Matter protesters.

John M. Tyson, Republican

https://www.judgejohntyson.com

https://www.facebook.com/judge.j.tyson

https://twitter.com/judgejohntyson

Tyson was first elected to a seat on the Court of Appeals in 2000, was not reelected in 2008 but came back to win again in 2014 and is now running for reelection. He earned his bachelor’s degree from UNC-Wilmington in 1974 and his law degree from Campbell in 1979.

Tyson seems to be something of a volcanic conservative.

On May 7th, 2021, during a Black Lives Matter protest around the Market House in downtown Fayetteville, Tyson was alleged to have circled protestors and then on the second pass attempted to hit one of them with his SUV. The vehicle ended up on the sidewalk. The woman who appeared to be targeted filed charges against Tyson with the Fayetteville police, and a detective was assigned to investigate. Allegedly, the whole incident was captured on city videotape. Subsequently, Tyson was charged with misdemeanor assault with a deadly weapon. The charge was eventually dropped for lack of evidence.

Tyson is endorsed by, among other conservatives, the North Carolina Fraternal Order of Police, the NC Homebuilders PAC, the NC Right to Life PAC, the NC Values Coalition, U.S. Congressman Patrick McHenry, and former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows.

Gale Murray Adams, Democrat

https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100075554784291

https://judgegaleadams.com

https://twitter.com/JudgeGaleAdams

Adams was brought up in the tobacco fields of Warren County by a single mother of four. She is a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill (English and Economics) and NC Central University School of Law. She served as a JAG officer for the US Navy and as both a prosecutor and a Federal public defender in eastern North Carolina. She was elected in 2012 as a Superior Court judge in Cumberland County and has continued to serve on that bench until the present.

Past experiences include representing defendants who were charged with various criminal and military offenses; providing legal advice to service members, and prosecuting violent and property crimes, drug offenses, and child abuse.

Judge Adams spoke out against a Republican scheme to redistrict judicial districts to give Republicans an advantage in elections. Republican Rep. Justin Burr, a bail bondsman from Stanly County who was apparently reacting to the continued trouble the Republican majority was experiencing in court over unconstitutional laws, made a proposal to disband the Courts Commission and turn its advisory duties over to a legislative committee. “What is the rush?” Judge Gale Adams said at the time, relaying a message from the president of the North Carolina Conference of Superior Court Judges. “Why can’t the legislators simply take time to more fully and thoroughly study the issue about judicial redistricting? This is a critical issue that affects a large number of people, the citizens of our state, and so what is the rush? Why can’t we have a nonpartisan, impartial commission and study the impact that it has?”

Adams’ endorsements include the NC AFL-CIO, the National Association of Social Workers, and the Sierra Club.

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Salmon (D) v. Stroud (R), for the NC Court of Appeals

 

PamsPicks didn't endorse the Democrat in this Court of Appeals race. I may vote for him anyway on the theory that even a conservative Democrat is better than a conservative Republican. Make up your own mind.

NC Court of Appeals Judge, Seat 9

NOTE: You may vote for one. Candidates are presented below in the order they appear on your ballot.

Reason for my Non-Endorsement: I don’t endorse Democratic candidates who cast votes in favor of abortion restrictions and who seek to dictate who uses which bathroom. And I don’t endorse Republicans who receive endorsements from anti-abortion groups and cite Antonin Scalia as their judicial hero.

Brad A. Salmon, Democrat

https://www.judgebradsalmon.com

https://www.facebook.com/JudgeBradSalmon

Salmon is a founding partner at the Salmon Law Firm “where he focused on representing clients in various criminal, civil and administrative matters.” Previously, he served as a member of the North Carolina House of Representatives for District 51 — elected in 2014. He was defeated for reelection in 2016.

Salmon earned his Bachelor of Arts from North Carolina State University and his Juris Doctor from Campbell Law School. In November 2021, Governor Roy Cooper appointed Salmon to serve as District Court Judge in Judicial District 11, which serves Johnston, Harnett, and Lee counties.

Salmon is a mixed bag. While he has been rated over the years with generally low or moderate scores by very conservative groups, he receives mostly decent scores by outfits like the North Carolina League of Conservation Voters. While he supports Medicaid expansion in NC, he wasn’t sure how he felt about raising the state’s minimum wage. His environmental record is pretty good, but he voted in favor of HB2, a bill that required individuals to use bathrooms according to their biological sex and was the only Democrat to vote in favor of placing stricter regulations on abortion rights in 2015.

I contacted Salmon via Facebook messenger on October 13th to ask him the reasons for his votes on abortion rights and the Bathroom bill. While my message was read, I have yet to receive a response.

Donna Stroud, Republican

https://www.facebook.com/JudgeStroud

https://judgestroud.com/

https://twitter.com/judgestroud

First elected to the Appeals Court in 2006, Stroud is running for her 3rd 8-year term. She was born in Kinston, North Carolina, and received her bachelor’s degree in government summa cum laude from Campbell University at Buies Creek in 1985. She received her J.D. magna cum laude from Campbell University School of Law in 1988. She also earned an LL.M. from Duke University School of Law in 2014.

In the candidate questionnaire for Ballotpedia, and among other answers, she said her favorite book was the Bible (no, really): “Of course, it’s not really one book; it is a collection of books, but it is the foundation of our legal system and it provides the best answers and guidance for every issue we confront in life.”

And she listed Antonin Scalia as her judicial hero (no, really): “I try to follow his example in his approach to cases as an originalist and textualist. His opinions are exceptionally well-written and clear.”

But the extreme conservative website The Daily Haymaker called her “Another RINO in a black robe,” so go figure. She’s endorsed by the NC Values Coalition (an anti-abortion advocacy group), Conservative Coalition NC, even the Sierra Club, and by Former Chief Judge Linda McGee, among a host of other former justices of the Supreme Court of North Carolina and judges of the North Carolina Court of Appeals.