Texas Supreme Court Justice Violates Texas Judicial Code of Conduct With Campaign Ad

Absolutely agree - this is shameful and concerning. I may want to see this repealed, but I want this done by judges with open minds – not by judges by with a ruling already in mind before the case starts. Judges, by nature of their position, should be neutral heading into a case. They should be free of bias and judge a case based on the facts presented during trial. Stating they will rule one way or another without hearing the facts of the case is wholly and completely inappropriate.

That being said, I’m not sure I buy this is an ad paid for and approved by Judge Willett. With this in mind, I just sent off an email (http://www.donwillett.com/contact) asking for clarification. I’ll post back if/when I get an answer. Below is the content of my email.

Justice Willett -

As a conservative, my biggest concern is impartiality on the bench. I hate to think any judge has made up his/her mind about a case before hearing the case in its entirety. With this in mind, I came across what was appeared to be a Facebook ad for your campaign. The text stated 'Help re-elect the court's Antidote to ObamaCare'.

Is this indeed an official approved ad for your campaign?

Looking forward to your response.
--Patrick

The canon quoted above appears to apply to "cases within the scope of the pledge" which I imagine is a way of saying that it only applies to issues that might come before the court to which a judicial candidate is seeking election. So is there any plausible way that the issue of whether federal health care legislation violates the federal constitution would be an issue in a case that comes before the Texas Supreme Court? Maybe but it seems like a stretch. But that is actually the problem - it implies that a Texas Supreme Court justice can have some impact on federal healthcare legislation and therefore you should bring your Obamacare frustration with you when you vote for that office. But I don't think that's the case - the Texas Supreme Court is highly unlikely to ever have any impact on anything related to Obamacare. So the ad may not violate the cannon but only because it's arguably misleading since it implies that the Texas Supreme Court has some say in the matter.