Iowa Supreme Court elections, 2022
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The terms of two Iowa Supreme Court justices expired on December 31, 2022. The two seats were up for retention election on November 8, 2022. The filing deadline was July 27, 2022.[1]
Iowa was one of 30 states that held elections for state supreme court in 2022. That year, 84 of the 344 seats on state supreme courts were up for election. Of those, 64 were held by nonpartisan justices, 13 were held by Republican justices, and eight were held by Democratic justices. For more on the partisan affiliation of state supreme court justices, click here. For an overview of state supreme court elections in 2022, click here.
Candidates and results
McDermott retention election
Iowa Supreme Court, Matthew McDermott's seat
Matthew McDermott was retained to the Iowa Supreme Court on November 8, 2022 with 67.5% of the vote.
Retention Vote |
% |
Votes |
|||
| ✔ | Yes |
67.5
|
605,391 | ||
No |
32.5
|
291,264 | |||
Total Votes |
896,655 | ||||
|
|
Oxley retention election
Iowa Supreme Court, Dana Oxley's seat
Dana Oxley was retained to the Iowa Supreme Court on November 8, 2022 with 67.0% of the vote.
Retention Vote |
% |
Votes |
|||
| ✔ | Yes |
67.0
|
591,837 | ||
No |
33.0
|
291,799 | |||
Total Votes |
883,636 | ||||
|
|
Voting information
- See also: Voting in Iowa
About the Iowa Supreme Court
- See also: Iowa Supreme Court
The Iowa Supreme Court is the court of last resort for the state of Iowa. The court is composed of seven justices who serve eight-year terms. Justices are chosen through a commission-selection, political appointment method, and stand for retention in order to serve subsequent terms.[2][3]
Political composition
This was the political composition of the supreme court heading into the 2022 election.
| ■ Vacant | Appointed by Gov. Tom Vilsack (D) in 2006 | |
| ■ Susan Christensen | Appointed by Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) in 2018 | |
| ■ Edward Mansfield | Appointed by Gov. Terry E. Branstad (R) in 2011 | |
| ■ Matthew McDermott | Appointed by Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) in 2020 | |
| ■ Christopher McDonald | Appointed by Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) in 2019 | |
| ■ Dana Oxley | Appointed by Gov. Kim Reynolds (R) in 2020 | |
| ■ Thomas Waterman | Appointed by Gov. Terry E. Branstad (R) in 2011 |
Selection
- See also: Judicial selection in Iowa
In 1962, a constitutional amendment was passed which changed the court's method of judicial selection to a commission-selection, political appointment method, sometimes referred to as "merit selection." This amendment applies to all appellate and district court justices. Judicial nominees are selected by the Iowa Judicial Nominating Commission. The governor then makes the appointment from the list submitted by the commission. One year after the appointment, the justice must stand for retention in the next general election. If a judge is not retained, his or her term ends on December 31 following the election. Once retained, judges serve for eight-year terms. The mandatory retirement age for judges is 72.[4][5]
Qualifications
Justices must be lawyers admitted to practice in Iowa. They must be able to serve a full term of office before reaching the mandatory retirement age of 72.[4]
Chief justice
The justices of the court elect their chief justice. The term of chief justice matches that justice's regular term on the court.[6]
Analysis
Ballotpedia Courts: Determiners and Dissenters (2021)
In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: Determiners and Dissenters, a study on how state supreme court justices decided the cases that came before them. Our goal was to determine which justices ruled together most often, which frequently dissented, and which courts featured the most unanimous or contentious decisions.
The study tracked the position taken by each state supreme court justice in every case they decided in 2020, then tallied the number of times the justices on the court ruled together. We identified the following types of justices:
- We considered two justices opinion partners if they frequently concurred or dissented together throughout the year.
- We considered justices a dissenting minority if they frequently opposed decisions together as a -1 minority.
- We considered a group of justices a determining majority if they frequently determined cases by a +1 majority throughout the year.
- We considered a justice a lone dissenter if he or she frequently dissented alone in cases throughout the year.
Summary of cases decided in 2020
- Number of justices: 7
- Number of cases: 103
- Percentage of cases with a unanimous ruling: 68.0% (70)
- Justice most often writing the majority opinion: Justice Edward Mansfield (21)
- Per curiam decisions: 13
- Concurring opinions: 16
- Justice with most concurring opinions: Justice Brent Appel (13)
- Dissenting opinions: 38
- Justice with most dissenting opinions: Justice Brent Appel (20)
For the study's full set of findings in Iowa, click here.
Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship (2020)
- See also: Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship
Last updated: June 15, 2020
In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship, a study examining the partisan affiliation of all state supreme court justices in the country as of June 15, 2020.
The study presented Confidence Scores that represented our confidence in each justice's degree of partisan affiliation, based on a variety of factors. This was not a measure of where a justice fell on the political or ideological spectrum, but rather a measure of how much confidence we had that a justice was or had been affiliated with a political party. To arrive at confidence scores we analyzed each justice's past partisan activity by collecting data on campaign finance, past political positions, party registration history, as well as other factors. The five categories of Confidence Scores were:
- Strong Democrat
- Mild Democrat
- Indeterminate[7]
- Mild Republican
- Strong Republican
We used the Confidence Scores of each justice to develop a Court Balance Score, which attempted to show the balance among justices with Democratic, Republican, and Indeterminate Confidence Scores on a court. Courts with higher positive Court Balance Scores included justices with higher Republican Confidence Scores, while courts with lower negative Court Balance Scores included justices with higher Democratic Confidence Scores. Courts closest to zero either had justices with conflicting partisanship or justices with Indeterminate Confidence Scores.[8]
Iowa had a Court Balance Score of 3.29, indicating Republican control of the court. In total, the study found that there were 15 states with Democrat-controlled courts, 27 states with Republican-controlled courts, and eight states with Split courts. The map below shows the court balance score of each state.
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ Iowa Legislature, "Election Laws," accessed February 2, 2022
- ↑ Iowa Judicial Branch, ""Court Structure,"" accessed September 26, 2014
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedsupreme - ↑ 4.0 4.1 Iowa Judicial Branch, "Guide to Iowa's Court System," December 2005
- ↑ Iowa Judicial Branch, "20th Century Reforms," accessed September 26, 2014
- ↑ Iowa Judicial Branch, "Supreme Court Justices," accessed September 26, 2014
- ↑ An Indeterminate score indicates that there is either not enough information about the justice’s partisan affiliations or that our research found conflicting partisan affiliations.
- ↑ The Court Balance Score is calculated by finding the average partisan Confidence Score of all justices on a state supreme court. For example, if a state has justices on the state supreme court with Confidence Scores of 4, -2, 2, 14, -2, 3, and 4, the Court Balance is the average of those scores: 3.3. Therefore, the Confidence Score on the court is Mild Republican. The use of positive and negative numbers in presenting both Confidence Scores and Court Balance Scores should not be understood to that either a Republican or Democratic score is positive or negative. The numerical values represent their distance from zero, not whether one score is better or worse than another.
Federal courts:
Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: Northern District of Iowa, Southern District of Iowa • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: Northern District of Iowa, Southern District of Iowa
State courts:
Iowa Supreme Court • Iowa Court of Appeals • Iowa district courts
State resources:
Courts in Iowa • Iowa judicial elections • Judicial selection in Iowa
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