News Release

Austin, TX: By July 2002, the 10 major party Texas Supreme Court candidates who survived the March primaries already raised a total of $2,982,684 in the 2002 election cycle, a new Texans for Public Justice study reports. The Republican primary weeded out four other candidates who raised an additional $1.7 million—including incumbent Justice Xavier Rodriguez.

“Despite Chief Justice Phillips’ pledge to reject new campaign contributions for his reelection bid, candidates for other court seats are raking in special-interest money as usual,” said Texans for Public Justice director Craig McDonald. “The candidates names have changed, but their sponsors remain the same. Law firms and the so-called ‘tort reformers’ continue to be the top high-court donors.”

Key findings of “Vote of No Confidence: The 2002 Texas Supreme Court Election” include:

• Of the 10 major-party candidates still in the running for five available Supreme Court seats, the GOP candidates out-raised ($2,198,130) their Democratic opponents ($783,754) 3:1. Judge Margaret Mirabal, who raised $315,332, was the only Democrat to out-raise a GOP opponent (Steve Smith raised $5,500).
• Justice Wallace Jefferson, the sole incumbent justice still raising money for November, is the top fundraiser, having raised $908,458 so far. Wallace raised five times as much money as his primary and general election opponents combined.
• An additional $1,720,363 was raised by four failed primary candidates, including incumbent Justice Xavier Rodriguez, who raised $708,048 but was defeated by Steve Smith’s frugal campaign.
• Eight of the top-10 law-firm donors¹  were corporate defense firms and two were plaintiff firms. Vinson & Elkins again lead the pack, giving these judicial candidates a total of $124,305.
• Nine of the top-10 non-law donors represent business interests, led by the business tort group Texans for Lawsuit Reform ($55,056).
• In an unusual step, a Republican PAC made the top-10 list by picking sides in a GOP primary (giving $25,000 apiece to the campaigns of incumbent Justices Xavier Rodriguez and Wallace Jefferson).

Several high court candidates failed to comply with Texas’ judicial campaign disclosure laws. Candidates William Moody, Jesse Wainwright and Linda Yanez reported that their campaigns had zero cash-on-hand when their earlier reports suggested that they each had between $17,504 and $314,618 on hand. Candidate James Parson’s latest disclosure report reported legally required employer and occupation information for just one of his donors.

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^1. Including contributions by a firm and its PAC and employees.

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