Judge Susan Criss is one of two Democrats running against Republican Phil Johnson. Criss showed that she has raised more than $317,000 for her campaign in her latest financial report.
"People from every corner of our state are signing on to my campaign to protect their constitutional rights," Judge Criss said. "They deserve better than what they're getting from the current court, and they are willing to make sure I have the resources to run a winning campaign."
Judge Criss' report shows that she has raised $317,083 since entering the race last year, including $260,057 for the period from July 1, 2007 to December 31, 2007. Her report showed $150,549.72 cash on hand as of the end of the year.
The race for Texas Supreme Court is one only a small group of statewide races in 2008. The infrastructure this former prosecutor and criminal defense attorney can put together for her race will not only help U.S. Senate candidate Rick Noriega, but it will aide down ballot races too.
We look forward to seeing more good news about Democratic filings.
Judge Criss may be the lone candidate for Place 8 on the Texas Supreme Court. According to Vince over at Capitol Annex, Justice Yanez may not have the necessary signatures to make the primary and general election ballots.
The way the process works is that a candidate for the Texas Supreme Court must obtain 50 valid signatures from voters in each of the Court of Appeal districts. The problem for the Yanez campaign is that they seem to be lacking the necessary signatures in Districts 1 and 14.
As Vince points out in a follow up post, it may not be possible for they Yanez campaign to rectify the problem. There are some conflicts in the law and this may need to go to court to clarify the matter. In all likelihood, Criss will be the sole candidate running in Place 8.
While the race against Justice Phil Johnson is up in limbo in place 8, place 7 will have a contested primary while Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson will likely win an uncontested re-election.
Judge Susan Criss, a candidate for the Texas Supreme Court, sat on the 212th District Court in Galveston County in 1998. She directed the Gulf Coast Task Force on Jail Diversion for the Mentally Ill, a group that seeks to secure treatment for non-violent mentally ill offenders in the community while saving taxpayers money and freeing up jail space for violent criminals. The Gulf Coast National Alliance for the Mentally Ill named her their top honoree for 2003 for her efforts.
Judge Criss earned a BA in Government from the University of Texas at Austin and her law degree from the South Texas College of Law in Houston.
She earned a reputation as the blogging judge after she began her site, As the Island Floats, earlier this year.
Judge Criss was nice enough to sit down and answer a few questions about her race, experience, and what she wants to do for Texans.
Susan Criss continues to become a more and more interesting candidate. In a piece reprinted over at Edinburg Politics, the Criss family has a legacy of protecting workers rights and promoting civil rights.
District Judge Susan Criss of Galveston, a Democratic Party candidate for Texas Supreme Court, says a series of laws passed by the Texas Legislature in the 1980s help free Texas farm workers from "slavery." She credited her father, former Rep. Lloyd Criss, D-Galveston, Sen. Juan "Chuy" Hinojosa, D-McAllen, and former Rep. Alex Moreno, Jr., D-Edinburg, among others, for what she says was "landmark civil rights" legislation in Texas.
Lloyd Criss, Jr., was once the chair of the House Committee on Labor and Employment Relations and worked with the Mexican American Legislative Caucus (MALC) "to protect tens of thousands of Texas farm workers from economic exploitation, health hazards, stoop labor, and even poisoning."
"It is hard to believe, but it is true - farm workers, mostly Mexican Americans, were denied the basic protections that everyone else had back then because they had no political power, no one to fight for them," said Judge Susan Criss. She has served for almost a decade as the judge of the 212th District Court in Galveston County.
"It is astonishing to realize that for all practical purposes, slavery still existed in Texas as late as the 1980s," Judge Susan Criss said. "I am so proud that my father was able to play a key role in helping bring justice to thousands of our fellow Texans."
According to the Texas Insider, eventually, Lloyd Criss, Jr. also fought for a law that now requires that outdoor toilets for men and women be provided for farm workers at their work sites, Judge Susan Criss said. Lloyd Criss, Jr. also carried the legislation that provided unemployment insurance for farm workers, a goal that had been sought for about 50 years. That measure was so significant that César Estrada Chávez, the co-founder of the United Farmworkers of America and a national civil rights activist, came to Austin to support the Criss legislation.
Texas Democratic candidates each have their unique stories. It isn't often we get to share in such candor in a statewide race.
Despite some logistical challenges, and a last minute venue change, the meeting was well attended and most came away from the event with a positive impression of Judge Criss.
Another controversy surrounds a Republican Supreme Court Justice.
Three months after a fire destroyed the home of Texas Supreme Court Justice David Medina, investigators are treating the blaze as arson, saying it is "very suspicious," in part because a dog detected an accelerant, the Harris County Fire Marshal's Office said Tuesday.
Back in my hometown in the Spring area, Justice David Medina and his neighbors house burnt down (along with severe damage to a third home) nearly 3 months ago. The total damage is estimated to be close to a million dollars.
According to the Houston Chronicle, Nathan Green, the fire marshal's office's lead investigator on the case said six "persons of interest," all of whom are Medina family members or friends, have been identified in the investigation, which is expected to be completed within 90 days. He said there were inconsistencies in Medina's and his wife's account of where he was the night of the fire. She was at home.
The Chronicle goes further outlining Medina's financial problems.
According to public records, a mortgage company filed to foreclose on the home in June 2006. Green said Medina and the mortgage company reached an agreement the following December. Green said the foreclosure filing on the house was a "very, very big red flag" for investigators.
He said Medina did not have an insurance policy on the home and that the justice, appointed to the Texas Supreme Court in 2004 by Gov. Rick Perry, was surprised when he learned a policy had lapsed.
"It was an oversight on somebody's part that the premiums didn't get paid," said Green, who added the family moved to Austin after they lost their home.
The loan on the house was insured by the finance company, he said.
There is a problem with the Texas Supreme Court race. It is a basic math question. There are three seats, with two candidates, but there is only one race. The Texas Supreme Court has three potential seats-- Wallace Jefferson for Chief Justice, Phil Johnson in Place 8, or Dale Wainwright for Place 7. Instead of having Democratic nominees in all three of these seats, we have two highly qualified candidates running against Phil Johnson in place 8.
All three seats are statewide elections and all three seats have a democratic base number of 43.2%. All three Republicans need to be challenged and all three incumbents are out of touch, do nothing, place holders.
Rather than having a bitter primary fight between two amazing candidates, it is time to have two great candidates take the fight to the corrupt Republicans. Having viable candidates in every race is the only way we can get our courts back. This is, after all, the Court that Rove built.
In 1988, Rove helped Tom Phillips become the first Republican elected as Chief Justice of the Texas Supreme Court. Phillips had been appointed to the position in November 1987 by Clements. Phillips was re-elected in 1990, 1996 and 2002.
Phillips' election in 1988 was part of an aggressive grassroots campaign called "Clean Slate '88", a conservative effort that was successful in getting five of its six candidates elected. (Ordinarily there were three justices on the ballot each year, on a nine-justice court, but, because of resignations, there were six races for the Supreme Court on the ballot in November 1988.) By 1998, Republicans held all nine seats on the Court.
Tom Phillips is now an attorney at Baker Botts, but the fact remains, Rove used the court to launch the Republican take over in Texas. As long as two fantastic candidates like Susan Criss and Linda Yanez fight each other in a primary, Texas loses. Hopefully one of these candidates will take on Dale Wainwright or Chief Justice Wallace Jefferson instead. We need a trio of heroes fighting for us and working to undo everything Karl Rove built.
Ben Sargent, Rick Noriega, Mikal Watts and Susan Criss all together This Sunday at the Brazos County Democratic Party's second annual Jefferson-Jackson Day Banquet and Silent Auction at 7:00 PM Briarcrest Country Club Ballroom, 1929 Country Club Drive in Bryan. For more information call 979-779-5600
There has been a lot of talk and hope that Texas Democrats can finally win a statewide race again for the first time in 14 years this coming cycle, but almost all of that talk seems to be focused around John Cornyn and his vulnerabilities. This is not something that I want to talk about today.
I have two primary reasons that I will not talk about this campaign right now. The first is that they already receive a heavy amount of analysis, criticism, and optimism: there is so much that I feel I cannot fairly add to any of it fairly right now. (I am also already decidedly a Noriega supporter, and therefore such an article would already be bias in that direction.)
Secondly, though; it is my belief that those are the two statewide positions in which the party that holds the seat cannot say they are a very strong force in the state. They are high profile positions that, thanks to that high publicity, allow voters to more easily factor in the assets and vices of individual candidates as opposed to only party-lines. For example, the Democrats won the 1996 presidential elections due to the candidate they had on the ticket, for they certainly did not hold the nation (as the Congressional numbers clearly showed). It is certainly a starting point to win a Senate seat or a Governor's seat, but I think if we can win more it would show that Texas is truly once again coming to our side.
In 2008, the U.S. Senate seat is not the only statewide office up for grabs. For those who aren't political fanatics (as most of you probably are), we have some statewide justice positions available, too.
