“Merit” Selection Lobbyists Target Nevada
July 14, 2009
Nevadans will vote next year on a proposed constitutional amendment that will abolish democratic judicial elections and replace them with a “merit” selection scheme that would give legal special interest groups the upper hand when it comes to picking judges. Voters rejected a similar plan in 1988, reports a Las Vegas Journal-Review editorial. So Justice at Stake – the campaign group bankrolled by billionaire hedge fund titan George Soros – has launched a sophisticated lobbying campaign aimed at getting Nevadans to give up their right to vote for judges.
Nevada Chief Justice James Hardesty, for example, objects that 64 percent of judges seeking re-election in 2008 ran unopposed – “the worst form of rubber-stamped democracy” that “leaves the voter with no power at all,” as he put it. The “merit” selection solution: Have 100 percent of judges run unopposed and eliminate voter participation entirely.
The Las Vegas Journal-Review editorial neatly shreds this proposal:
“Their claim that approval of the ballot question would remove politics from the process of selecting judges is pure folly. All it would do is empower a group of mostly unelected citizens to substitute their judgment for the electorate’s ….”
Nevada Update: Election Law Dies, ACORN plans to fight on
June 4, 2009
The Nevada Attorney General’s office rolled their eyes this week when they were forced to respond to ACORN’s claim that the charges being brought against illegally paid canvassers were “politically motivated.” The Modesto Bee reports that ACORN lawyer, Lisa Rasmussen, believes that the “charges…just highlight a voter registration system that is broken.”
Broken? Surely ACORN, the same organization that has been accused of filing fraudulent voter registrations in multiple states, can come up with a better defense of their shenanigans.
This news also comes on the heels of the failure of the Nevada Assembly to take up a major election law bill which Nevada Secretary of State Ross Miller supported. The Las Vegas FOX affiliate describes the purpose of the bill:
The proposal included felony penalties for offenses such as intimidating voters and interfering in the conduct of an election. It also proposed to streamline the election process, in part by creating an electronic voter database to give people the option of registering to vote online.
Miller also had said the bill would combat election fraud, citing alleged election fraud abuses involving political advocacy group ACORN, the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now.
Whether or not the bill would have actually worked, it is good to see that some state governments are taking ACORN’s threat to their election system seriously.
Why Secretaries of State Matter
May 19, 2009
Over the last week ACORN has received a lot of press attention. But let’s take a closer look at an ACORN incident that happened during the 2008 campaign cycle.
If Minnesota Secretary of State Mark Ritchie is a prime example of how these powerful, but little known public officials can tip the scales in tight elections (see my earlier post), then Nevada’s Ross Miller shows how they can and should operate to prevent voter fraud and ensure fair elections. Last year, Mary Pat Flaherty reported in the Washington Post that Ross’ and the Nevada AG’s office raided ACORN’s operation in Las Vegas. The state also filed criminal charges against ACORN and two former employees for allegedly paying employees to sign up voters, with quotas of new voters required to keep their jobs and a “blackjack” bonus for signing up 21 new voters (hey, it’s Nevada). According to Flaherty:
“The Nevada office of ACORN had planned a potluck dinner at its Las Vegas office Tuesday night to celebrate the 80,000 newly registered voters its staff had signed up in Clark County as part of its work with low-income communities nationwide.
“Instead, their office was raided Tuesday morning by agents of the Nevada Secretary of State and Attorney General who alleged in an application for a search warrant that ACORN had hired 59 felons through a work release program as canvassers and submitted nearly 300 apparently fraudulent voter registration cards as part of the drive.
“The submitted voter cards included addresses and names that do not exist in Nevada, duplicate registrations, names culled from telephone books and names of Dallas Cowboys players, an investigator for the Secretary of State alleged in his affidavit for a search warrant.
“One ex-employee of ACORN reached by the state investigator told him she began making up names for her forms on days when it was too hot to work outside. ACORN canvassers are paid by the hour. Ex-employees also said they were expected to collect 20 complete forms a shift or risk probation and termination, the investigator said in his affidavit.”
ACORN southwest regional director Matthew Henderson called the raid “a politically motivate stunt” undertaken because many voters registered through ACORN are “working people and people of color and there may be corners of the political world where a high injection of new voters like those is unsettling some.”
Give me a break.
Both Secretary of State Ross Miller and Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto are Democrats. Glad to see that combating registration fraud and enforcing election laws are being done honestly in Nevada.
I’m looking forward to the trial. Maybe we can find out why ACORN chose the Cowboys.
Nevada: “Merit Selection” Makes A Start
July 23, 2008
In 2007, the Nevada Legislature approved switching to a “merit selection” system for the first time. If the Legislature does so again in 2009 and the voters approve in 2010, District Court and state Supreme Court judges would be nominated by a special-interest dominated committee, and the Governor would have to pick one of three nominees, rather than being elected by the people as they are now.
But the process is actually beginning this week with the state’s new Judicial Selection Commission interviewing candidates to replace a retiring Family Court judge. As Nevada Supreme Court Chief Justice Mark Gibbons says, “the process we would go through if this amendment passes in 2010 would be very similar to what you see [today], so the public would get a preview if they think this is a good process or mechanism for electing judges[.]”
Gibbons is simply wrong. First, “merit selection” isn’t a system for electing judges at all but rather one for selecting judges by special interests. The public has no say. That’s the whole point. Second, the process in Las Vegas this week will not be “very similar” because if the amendment passes, the process will be closed, As KLAS TV reporter Mark Sayre correctly notes, the process is being opened to the public for the first time today to offer a window onto how it might be done in the future. Or might not be done in the future, because since the proceedings would be closed, we’d never know. It reminds me of the old joke about elections in some countries in the developing world: “one person, one vote, one time.”
Doubtless, the Judicial Selection Commission will be on its best behavior today, so as not to scare the voters before 2010. But the real tests come later. What happens, for instance, if a Family Court judge issues terrible rulings, for instance not paying sufficient attention to the welfare of a child in state custody or ignoring a victim’s pleas in a domestic violence case? Under the current system, voters can toss the judge out; under “merit selection,” only the lawyers and special interests get to decide. And if the judge chooses to run for reelection, no one can run against the judge, making it more difficult for the judge to lose his seat.
Don’t think this can happen? Well, consider a couple recent incidents in Maryland including a judge who allegedly told defendants in domestic violence cases to look for another partner because “women are like buses — they come by every five minutes.”
The voters, not the special interests, deserve to decide who their judges are.
Putting Nevada On The Radar Screen
May 28, 2008
The Las Vegas Review-Journal recently polled lawyers in Clark County, Nevada to find out which system they favored for selecting judges: democratic elections, where voters decide, or a “merit selection” system, where a committee of lawyers vets candidates in secret and then sends an approved list to the governor.
Guess what? Lawyers think they ought to be in control!
Although the margin was overwhelming (2:1) at least one attorney got it right:
“The system we have in place [democratic elections] is the best. It allows the citizens of Clark County the opportunity to get rid of judges in elections, as they have clearly done in the past,” one pro-elections attorney wrote.
Nevada citizens have twice voted to preserve democratic elections and turned thumbs down on “merit selection.” But the lawyers keep on trying. Legislation has been introduced in the Nevada Senate (Senate Joint Resolution 2) to do away with elections, but it must pass the legislature twice before it can be put before the voters again - that means no earlier than 2010.