This year has left no doubt about the importance of courts, but the Supreme Court is not the only court that matters. State Supreme Courts are increasingly drawing attention during battles over redistricting, abortion, workplace protections, and more.
Here’s a fact to drive that home: “95% of all cases filed in the United States every year are filed in state courts,” the Alliance for Justice Action Fund’s Jake Faleschini told Bloomberg Law. Most of those aren’t going to make it to the state Supreme Court, but the ones that affect the most people will.
And here’s a reminder that Republicans are well aware of the importance of state Supreme Courts as well. “We figured out when it comes to redistricting, it’s no longer enough to control state legislative chambers,” the Republican State Leadership Committee’s Andrew Romeo said.
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That mention of state legislatures is instructive, because Republicans understood the importance of those bodies and invested in winning them long before Democrats did. If they’re turning the same attention to state Supreme Courts, they’re unlikely to be joking around. This cycle, for instance, the Republican State Leadership Committee plans to spend $5 million on state Supreme Court races.
State legislatures have a lot more seats than supreme courts, so it can take quite a few seats to change the balance of power. When you’re talking about a seven-member court, though, everyone is focused on the same seat or seats. As it is for politics, so it is for decisions: “On state supreme courts, just a few shifts in position could have made a big difference,” the Brookings Institutions’ Russell Wheeler told Bloomberg Law. Close decisions, close partisan splits, and big outcomes.
That’s where we come in. Daily Kos has partnered with Julia Louis-Dreyfus to endorse candidates in key state Supreme Court races in Michigan, North Carolina, and Ohio—all states where the balance of power on those courts is up for grabs this November. Democrats have 4-3 majorities in Michigan and North Carolina, while Republicans have a 4-3 majority in Ohio, but with one Republican justice willing to cross partisan lines on some key cases. That justice is retiring, though, and her replacement could swing the court hard right.
We are right on the brink of having raised $200,000 for these races that until the past few cycles would have drawn very little public notice. Our endorsed candidates will need all the help they can get, though, to push back the inevitable Republican dark-money-funded lies.
Let's blow past $200,000 and keep going. Can you chip in $1 to win each of these critical state Supreme Court races?
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