Four Abbott-appointed Supreme Court justices running for reelection

(The Center Square) – On Nov. 3, four incumbent Texas Supreme Court justices are running for reelection.

All Republicans, they were appointed by Gov. Greg Abbott, a former Texas Supreme Court justice. They are Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock, Place 1; Justices James P. Sullivan, Place 2; Kyle Hawkins, Place 7; and Brett Busby, Place 8.

The Texas Supreme Court is the highest court that rules on civil cases. Every general election, three seats are on the ballot.

The high court has been a target of Democratic political action committees, including one led by former Attorney General Eric Holder. In 2024, Holder’s National Democratic Redistricting Committee poured millions of dollars into targeting three Texas Supreme Court justices, including the now chief justice, Blacklock. Holder’s efforts failed. All three justices won their elections, The Center Square reported.

The NDRC’s stated goal is to alter the 2031 redistricting cycle nationwide. After its failed 2024 election efforts in Texas, this election it’s supporting efforts to get more Democrats elected to the state legislature and has backed off targeting Texas Supreme Court justices.

After he was reelected in 2024, Blacklock told The Center Square, “The historic results in judicial races across Texas are a resounding rejection of efforts by Eric Holder and other left-wing groups to influence our state’s judiciary.” He also said that Texans “want law and order, not chaos and crime. Texans want judges who will follow the text of the Constitution, not judges who will rewrite the law to serve a political agenda.”

In his State of the Judiciary address in January 2025, Blacklock outlined his perspective and that of the court’s: originalism. “The Texas Supreme Court has repeatedly held that originalism, not living constitutionalism, is the right way to interpret our Constitution,” he said, referring to justices who attempt to legislate from the bench. “In Texas, under this Supreme Court, the living constitution is dead.”

Running against him for Place 1 is Democratic challenger Justice Maggie Ellis of the Third Court of Appeals. The first openly queer justice elected to the court, she said she was running after the high court ruled that judges can refrain from performing weddings of same-sex couples based on sincerely held religious beliefs.

In Place 2, Sullivan is running for reelection after being appointed in January 2025. He previously served as Abbott’s general counsel and deputy general counsel as well as solicitor general when Abbott was attorney general. He wrote the high-profile opinion in June when the court ruled a Tarrant County resident who underwent gender modification surgery could sue her healthcare providers for fraud.

Running against him is Democrat Justice Chari Kelly of the Third Court of Appeals. Kelly is a former felony prosector and former assistant attorney general and Army veteran. She says she’s running because the “Texas Supreme Court has become a rubber stamp for the executive branch and has failed to live up to its purpose of independently interpreting the law.”

In Place 7, Hawkins is running for reelection after being appointed last October. He previously served as Texas solicitor general and assistant solicitor general as well as a clerk for the Fifth Circuit and U.S. Supreme Court. Challenging him is Democrat Judge Kristen Hawkins of the 11th District Court in Houston who oversaw COVID-lockdown era policies. While both have the same last name, they are not related.

In Place 8, Busby is running for reelection after being appointed in 2019. He previously served on Texas’ 14th Court of Appeals in Houston. He also clerked in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals and U.S. Supreme Court. In 2024, he joined three justices in dissenting from the court’s decision to deny a request to review a case from Austin real estate developer Nate Paul, a political donor at the heart of the 2023 impeachment of Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Challenging him is Democrat JusticeGisela Trianaof the Third Court of Appeals, who has argued that the Texas Supreme Court is “beholden to special interests,” the Texas Tribunereported.

In 2021, Kelly and Triana were two of three on a Third Court of Appeals panel who ruled that the lawsuit brought against Paxton by his former employees could go forward under the Texas Whistleblower Act.