WASHINGTON ? Interest groups pumped millions of dollars into state judicial elections in the last election cycle, threatening to undermine the impartiality of judges, according to a report issued Thursday.
Political parties and advocacy groups working independently from candidates are accounting for a greater share of spending on judicial elections. They accounted for $11.5 million, or nearly 30 percent, of money spent in the 2009-2010 election cycle. That's a 60 percent jump from four years ago.
The growth helps explain the nasty tone of some judicial elections. While candidates mostly stuck to positive advertisements, interest groups ran three of every four attack ads, the report found. It was compiled by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law and two other groups.
The increase is part of a campaign "that seeks to intimidate America's state judges into becoming accountable to money and ideologies instead of the constitution and the law," the report said.
The most expensive judicial elections took place in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Illinois, where the courts were closely divided along party lines.
In Michigan, the state GOP spent an estimated $4 million, and the Michigan Democratic Party spent $1.6 million. The report said their efforts dwarfed those of the candidates, to the point that candidates "seemed like bystanders in their own elections." The judicial elections in Michigan were the most expensive such contests in the country.
Perhaps the most abrupt change took place in Iowa, where not a single penny was spent in state high-court elections from 2000 to 2009. That changed after the Iowa Supreme Court struck down a state law banning same-sex marriage. National groups, led by the National Organization for Marriage, spent nearly $1 million to vote out three state justices trying to retain their seats. A group called Fair Courts for Us, led by former Gov. Robert Ray, spent about $400,000 in an unsuccessful bid to support the incumbents.
The report described the results of the Iowa election as chilling because the campaign was intended to send a warning to judges in all states.
But Brian Brown, president of the National Organization for Marriage, said talk of intimidation by interest groups is just wrong. Rather, he said, the groups are putting their trust in voters.
"Is it intimidation when someone says to a politician, `You've gone too far. I can't vote for you again'?" Brown said. "That's not intimidation. That's democracy at work."
The report said the Supreme Court's controversial decision, in a 2010 campaign spending case known as Citizens United, proved a mixed blessing. It ended corporate and labor restrictions on independent spending on the one hand, but it reinforced the constitutionality of campaign disclosure requirements on the other. Despite that green light, many states have fallen far short of enacting effective disclosure laws. The report said inadequate disclosure in some states can leave the public in the doubt about who pays to try to elect or remove candidates for judge.
In Iowa, the law made clear who was supporting the effort to remove three justices. But in Michigan, the report said, it was impossible to confirm who bankrolled the two political parties' spending.
The Brennan Center worked with the National Institute on Money in State Politics and the Justice at Stake Campaign to compile the report. The latter is an advocacy group that describes its mission as keeping special interests out of the courtroom.
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