NC Supremes Bob Edmunds Must Face Challenger

BREAKING NEWS
Ruling  Stands: "Retention Elections," unconstitutional

The "retention election" law passed in 2015 -- overturned by a 3-judge panel as unconstitutional in Feb. 2016 -- will stay overturned because of a 3-3 tie today on the NC Supreme Court

Sabra Faires

Background
Last February, a special three-judge panel ruled in Sabra Faires et al. v. State Board of Elections et al. that the Berger-Moore innovation called "retention elections" was and is unconstitutional. The "retention election" law (passed quietly in 2015 to go into effect in 2016) effectively applied to only one human being, sitting Supreme Court Justice Bob Edmunds (R), up for reelection in 2016, because the retention election law mandated that any Supreme Court justice (and only a Supreme Court justice, on which, see below) up for reelection in 2016 (which would be Edmunds alone) did not have to run competitively against a known opponent but was subject to a voter plebiscite instead -- voters would vote only on whether Edmunds should be retained -- "yes" or "no" -- not on him or his known opponent. Under the Berger-Moore law, if by some fluke voters in the majority said "no," then the governor would get to appoint Edmunds' successor. Nice touch, that!

Sabra Faires, a lawyer in Raleigh who also wanted to run for Edmunds' seat, cried foul and sued on constitutional grounds: "retention elections" fundamentally violated the meaning of "election" as a choice. A special three-judge panel in Wake County agreed with her.

The State Board of Elections naturally appealed ... to the NC Supreme Court. The Supreme Court took the case. Interesting, since the retention election law, if it stood legal challenge, would eventually apply to the longevity of every last one of those justices, a clear conflict of interest. Edmunds, of course, recused himself. The remaining six justices split along partisan lines, creating an unbreakable tie of 3-3, Republicans Mark Martin, Paul Newby, and Barbara Jackson on one side, Democrats Sam Ervin IV, Cheri Beasley, and Robin Hudson on the other.

Bob Edmunds

When she spoke in Watauga on April 16, Sabra Faires said that she and the other plaintiffs did not make an issue of the conflict of interest (which plaintiffs could have, calling for a special and impartial panel). With Edmunds recused, it seemed pretty predictable that the court would tie 3-3, which would mean the lower court ruling would stand.

Bottomline
There will be an election in November between Bob Edmunds and whoever comes out on top in the primary June 7th: Sabra Faires, Daniel Robertson, or Mike Morgan. Take a guess who I'm voting for.

Footnote: Why the Retention Law Applied to Supreme Court Justices Alone
Berger Family Values
The original draft of the retention election law included all appellate level judges, meaning both NC Court of Appeals judges and Supreme Court judges. Written to include the appeals court, the law would have ruled out Phil Berger Junior's ability to challenge Linda Stephens. If she were "retained" under a new law, Junior Berger would be shit out of luck.

Phil Berger Senior, who runs Republican government in Raleigh, changed the law to apply only to the Supreme Court, and paved the way for his son.

Primary Campaign Hangover

1. Watauga Conservatives PAC, the outfit behind the Kanoy/Trivette/Cornett yard signs, registered with the State Board of Elections on April 27, with Janet L. Woods listed as treasurer. They reported $1,000 raised, all of it given by Paula Medley who was herself present at some polling stations yesterday promoting the conservative School Board candidates. The PAC appears to have spent most of that $1,000 on those yard signs.

2. The State Board of Elections website last night was error-ridden and prone to crashing. News outlets in major cities were reduced to calling local county boards of elections to get accurate polling results. Heck of a job, SBOE.

3. In the 24th Prosecutorial District Attorney primary, also-ran third-place finished Nathan Miller (who got 19% of the vote district-wide) told the Watauga Democrat, "I'm disappointed that Watauga County Republicans did not show up at the polls." Well, they did show up in what may well turn out to be record numbers, eclipsing the Republican primary turnout of 2010. But unaffiliated voters also showed up, and the majority of them chose a Republican ballot to vote:

Republican ballots pulled: 3,832 (59.12%)
Democratic ballots pulled: 2,547 (39.29%)
Unaffiliated ballots pulled: 81 (1.25%)
Libertarian ballots pulled: 22 (.34%)

We don't yet have the total number of unaffiliated voters who showed up, but anecdotally we can conclude that they were not coming in to vote for Mr. Miller. Although he carried Watauga by -- what? -- some 46%, more votes were cast against him in Watauga than for him. #NathanMillerismFail

4. Before we leave the statistics directly above, and even without knowing how many total unaffiliated voters went to the polls in this primary, one thing is pretty clear: the local Republican Party has a big problem with independent voters. Supreme Court Justice Robin Hudson won Watauga County easily, Nathan Miller lost, and three progressive School Board candidates were in the top four finishers in that race. Unaffiliated voters don't tend to like the direction that the local GOP has been heading, especially perhaps in the matters of cronyism, voting rights, and the mismanagement of the local Board of Elections. #FourEggersismFail

5. The turnout of Appalachian State University students was de minimis. The local conservatives dependably blame student voters for their electoral failures, but they can't hide behind that lame excuse in this present case. #AnneMarieYatesismFail

Remarkable Numbers

Bald Mountain precinct still outstanding, but it's clear that at least 1,000 more Republican ballots were voted today than Democratic in Watauga, yet the three progressive School Board candidates finished first, second, and fourth among the six who are surviving the primary.

Those numbers have got to put some people back on their heels ... like me!

In other similarly amazing news, Supreme Court Associate Justice Robin Hudson appears to be leading state-wide in that outside-money-bashing judicial race.

Karen Lerch is leading Matt Klutz by a very slim margin in that Republican County Commission primary, which says something about the weakness in the mainstream Republican Party in Watauga.

On the other hand, Miller is leading Springer in Watauga in the district attorney race, but Springer appears to be way ahead in the whole district.

This Man Is a "Bought" Judge

Mecklenberg Superior Court Judge Eric Levinson is running for a seat on the NC Supreme Court, and he's being backed by Koch brothers money, among other big corporations.

Not that those "dark money" sources are promoting Levinson. No, they're tearing down the sitting incumbent Robin Hudson, who's running for reelection and who's being smeared every 15 minutes on TV as "soft on child molesters."

Scott Moneyham got to the truth of the matter yesterday. The damage that Koch money is doing to Robin Hudson is nothing compared to the damage they're doing to the entire judicial system in our state: "By bringing highly-charged partisan politics into these races, the real losers are the people of North Carolina. These ads encourage judges to decide cases based on partisan political considerations, and not fair interpretations of the law and constitution."

If Judge Levinson were interested in justice and not in personal advantage, he'd already have denounced the attacks on Hudson. If he makes it to the high court, he can sit with that other judicial "merchandise," Judge Paul Newby, who got his seat similarly bought for him in 2012.

Those guys are not put on the bench to render justice. They are there to render unto Caesar.