There’s actually fewer than you might think this year.
At least three dozen lawyers are vying for 17 contested judicial races on the Democratic ballot, crowding down-ballot races for Harris County courts that handle the most serious crimes to probate proceedings.
The sought-after benches with more than one Democratic candidate include eight civil courts and nine criminal courts for state and county proceedings, according to a review of filings from Harris County Democratic Party and Texas Secretary of State records. A handful of candidates signaled their election bids with treasurer appointments months ago, while others waited until the days or hours leading up to the Dec. 8 deadline to enter their respective March races.
Half a dozen courts — predominantly family law benches — did not draw challengers in either the primary or general election. Republicans, meanwhile, did not field competition among themselves and have put forth a slew of lawyers in most races after surprise success last year in flipping courts in their favor.
[…]
A University of Houston political science professor, Brandon Rottinghaus, noted the plethora of primary candidates is comparable to the 2016 primary race, when multiple Democratic candidates also competed against each other. As for why so many candidates have filed to run remains unclear, he said.
“The Democratic party has never done a good job policing the entrance into these races — maybe they’re letting nature take its course,” Rottinghaus said.
A small number of voters are aware of the inner-workings of the criminal and civil courts, but most Houstonians may rely on the perceived gender and ethnicity of candidates to guide their selection. In other words, Rottinghaus said, it’s conceivable an inner-party challenger could upset an incumbent judge for reasons outside their ability or performance.
Couple of points here. One, I don’t know how the HCDP or anyone else could “police the entry” into these races. I suppose there could be some kind of setup where one group largely controls campaign donors and the endorsement processes, which would at least make it hard to challenge whoever the anointed candidates were. That was the Republican setup in Harris County when they were winning all the judicial races. It was deeply corrupt, with the insiders running it like Gary Polland making out like bandits on the back end with large numbers of appointments to represent indigent clients. We don’t have anything like that, and we don’t want it. The downside is that sometimes good judges get challenged, and defeated, in primaries. That’s democracy, which can be messy. I’ll still take it.
Two, as is my wont, whenever I see a number like “17 contested judicial races on the Democratic ballot”, I try to put some context around it, to see if that number is big or small or unusual in some way. In 2022, when all of the benches involved had Democratic incumbents, there were 26 contested primaries. In 2018, when every Democratic nominee would be a challenger to a Republican incumbent, there were 21 contested primaries. In all cases, this is just counting the countywide races, so no Supreme Court/Court of Criminal Appeals, no 1st or 14th Courts of Appeals, and no Justice of the Peace races. This is the lightest year for contested Democratic judicial primaries (non-Presidential year edition) since 2014, when there were five. Make of that what you will.
Next, congratulations to Judges Angela Graves-Harrington, Janice Berg, Sandra Peake, Gloria Lopez, Sonya Heath, and Michelle Moore, for having no opponents in either March or November, thus ensuring your re-election. 2014 was also the last time that the Dems didn’t field a full slate of judicial candidates. If Greg Abbott fulfills his promise to turn Harris County “dark red”, those will be some missed opportunities for them. Better luck next time, y’all. Oh, and to call back to something I’ve said many times before: I fully expect these six lucky incumbents – and any other nominees from contested primaries, if there’s no Republican waiting for them – to put as much time and effort into stumping for themselves and their ballotmates as the candidates who are in contested races will be expected to do. Nobody gets to sit this one out.
Finally, I will begin running judicial Q&A responses on Monday. I’ve already received them from eleven candidates, so I’m well stocked to begin the year. Candidate interviews will also begin Monday, because as we all know it’s a sprint from here to March. Get ready to get to know who’s running for what. Murray Newman has more, specifically a look at the criminal court side of the ballot.
UPDATE: It has come to my attention that a couple of candidates have withdrawn from their primaries, so the total number of contested judicial races is now smaller than 17. I don’t have any details to share at the moment.