ATLANTA – A former Democratic congressman running for the Georgia State Supreme Court filed a federal lawsuit Monday, alleging that a state agency is unconstitutionally trying to block him from speaking out about abortion.
John Barrow sued hours before he was due to respond to a complaint that he is violating state judicial ethics rules and must make his campaign ads comply with state rules. Among the rules the Georgia Judicial Qualifications Commission complaint alleges Barrow is violating is one that prevents candidates from making commitments about how they will rule on issues likely to come before the high court.
Early voting is underway in the May 21 nonpartisan election between Barrow and Judge Andrew Pinson, who was appointed to the nine-judge court in 2022 by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp. Sitting judges in Georgia almost never lose or face serious challenges. The other three judges seeking new six-year terms are unopposed.
Facing this uphill battle, Barrow has made abortion the centerpiece of his campaign, saying he believes Georgia’s state constitution guarantees a right to abortion that is at least as strong as Roe v. Wade. Wade was before it was overturned in 2022. The ruling paved the way for a 2019 Georgia law to go into effect banning most abortions after fetal heart activity is detected, usually around the sixth week of pregnancy. This is before many women know they are pregnant.
A challenge to the Georgia law is pending in a state trial court and could be brought before the state Supreme Court. Barrow says that when Pinson was Georgia’s attorney general, he was the lawyer most responsible for the state’s support of the Mississippi case that led the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn Roe v. Wade.
Pinson declined to speak on the issue, but warned in an interview with the Associated Press in April that making legal disputes conventionally political will destroy people’s belief that the courts are fair and impartial.
“If Georgia goes down the path of politicizing these nonpartisan judicial races in this way, you’re going to lose this,” Pinson said. “I think this undermines people’s trust in an impartial judiciary.”
Barrow says the attempt to gag him violates his First Amendment right to free speech and his 14th Amendment right to equal protection under a 2002 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that found Minnesota could not prohibit candidates from advertising their views on legal and political issues.
“The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that I have a constitutional right to express my opinion on issues. And that is exactly what the Code of Judicial Conduct says,” Barrow said in a statement Monday. “This is because voters have the even more important constitutional right to know what they are voting for.”
Courtney Veal, executive director of the Judicial Qualifications Commission, did not respond to an email seeking comment.
The commission said in the letter to Barrow that its rules do not violate the ruling. Instead, the complaint alleges that Barrow went too far, saying he failed to emphasize a judge’s duty to uphold the law, “mischaracterized the role of a jurist as one who should (or would, in his case) ‘protect.’ selected rights,” made compromises on the issue, misrepresented present-day Georgia and gave the false impression that her vote alone could change abortion law in the state.
“Unfortunately, John Barrow chose to ignore Georgia’s code of judicial ethics,” Pinson spokesman Heath Garrett said in a statement. “His lawsuit makes clear that his goal is to negatively politicize legal disputes and destroy Georgians’ trust in fair and impartial courts.”
State Supreme Court races across the country have become much more political in recent decades, creating contests like last year’s in Wisconsin, where a liberal Democrat-backed judge flipped the court after defeating a former Republican-backed judge. and by anti-abortion groups most of the time. expensive race for state Supreme Court.
Barrow’s campaign is the first sign that a trend may be coming to Georgia, which has become a battleground in partisan elections. Many members of the state legal system view Barrow’s tactics with disgust.
On Monday, before Barrow announced his lawsuit, Pinson’s campaign released a statement from five former state Supreme Court justices, 12 former state bar presidents and two former Judicial Qualifications Commission officials warning that voters they must demand “that our judges be nonpartisan and refrain from making public commitments.” about how they will decide cases and issues.
“The alternative is a partisan judiciary that is encouraged to put campaign promises and personal preferences above the Constitution and the law,” the statement said. “The alternative would mean the end of the rule of law, and if our state goes down that path, we fear it will be very difficult to back down later.”
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