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Karen R. Baker
2025 - Present
2032
0
Karen R. Baker is the Chief Justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court. She assumed office on January 1, 2025. Her current term ends on December 31, 2032.
Baker ran for election as Chief Justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court. She won in the general runoff election on November 5, 2024.
Baker won re-election to the Arkansas Supreme Court in 2014, after running unopposed.[1]
In 2020, Ballotpedia published Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship, a study examining the partisan affiliation of all state supreme court justices in the country. As part of this study, we assigned each justice a Confidence Score describing our confidence in the degree of partisanship exhibited by the justices' past partisan behavior, before they joined the court.[2] Baker received a confidence score of Indeterminate.[3] Click here to read more about this study.
Biography
Baker earned her undergraduate degree from Arkansas Tech University in 1983, and her J.D. from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Law School in 1987.[4]
She was first elected in a special election in 2010 and sworn into office on January 10, 2011.[4][5] Baker served as a judge on the Arkansas Court of Appeals from 2000 to 2010, and as a judge in the Arkansas Twentieth Judicial District from 1995 to 2000. From 1987 to 1995 Baker was an attorney in private practice.[4] As of March 26, 2014, Baker was a member of the Arkansas Judicial Council and the Van Buren/Searcy County Bar Association where she served as president. Baker was also a member of the Law Journal of the University of Arkansas at Little Rock School of Law, and served as a supreme court liaison for the Arkansas Continuing Legal Education Board and the Arkansas Professional Practicum Committee.[4]
Elections
2024
See also: Arkansas Supreme Court elections, 2024
General runoff election
General runoff election for Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice
Karen R. Baker defeated Rhonda Wood in the general runoff election for Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice on November 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Karen R. Baker (Nonpartisan) | 52.7 | 546,713 |
 | Rhonda Wood (Nonpartisan)  | 47.3 | 491,148 | |
| Total votes: 1,037,861 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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General election
General election for Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice
Karen R. Baker and Rhonda Wood advanced to a runoff. They defeated Barbara Webb and Jay Martin in the general election for Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice on March 5, 2024.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Karen R. Baker (Nonpartisan) | 27.2 | 86,850 |
| ✔ | | Rhonda Wood (Nonpartisan) | 26.3 | 84,139 |
 | Barbara Webb (Nonpartisan) | 25.9 | 82,735 | |
 | Jay Martin (Nonpartisan) | 20.6 | 65,875 | |
| Total votes: 319,599 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Endorsements
Ballotpedia did not identify endorsements for Baker in this election.
2022
See also: Arkansas Supreme Court elections, 2022
General election
General election for Arkansas Supreme Court Position 6
Incumbent Karen R. Baker defeated Gunner DeLay in the general election for Arkansas Supreme Court Position 6 on May 24, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Karen R. Baker (Nonpartisan) | 64.0 | 262,043 |
 | Gunner DeLay (Nonpartisan) | 36.0 | 147,481 | |
| Total votes: 409,524 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
2014
Baker ran for re-election to the Arkansas Supreme Court. She won without opposition in the general election on May 20, 2014.[1][6]
2010
- See also: Arkansas Supreme Court elections and Arkansas judicial elections, 2010 for more information.
| Arkansas Supreme Court, Associate Justice, Position 6 2010 General election results | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Candidates | Votes | Percent | ||
Karen Baker 
|
206,365 | 48.4% | ||
| Tim Fox | 156,953 | 36.8% | ||
| Evelyn Moorehead | 63,450 | 14.9% | ||
- Click here for 2010 General Election Results from the Arkansas Secretary of State.
Campaign themes
2024
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Karen R. Baker did not complete Ballotpedia's 2024 Candidate Connection survey.
2022
Karen R. Baker did not complete Ballotpedia's 2022 Candidate Connection survey.
Campaign finance summary
Note: The finance data shown here comes from the disclosures required of candidates and parties. Depending on the election or state, this may represent only a portion of all the funds spent on their behalf. Satellite spending groups may or may not have expended funds related to the candidate or politician on whose page you are reading this disclaimer. Campaign finance data from elections may be incomplete. For elections to federal offices, complete data can be found at the FEC website. Click here for more on federal campaign finance law and here for more on state campaign finance law.
Analysis
Ballotpedia Courts: State Partisanship (2020)
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. This was not a measure of where a justice fell on an ideological spectrum, but rather a measure of how much confidence we had that a justice was or had been affiliated with a political party. The scores were based on seven factors, including but not limited to party registration.[7]
The five resulting categories of Confidence Scores were:
- Strong Democrat
- Mild Democrat
- Indeterminate[8]
- Mild Republican
- Strong Republican
This justice's Confidence Score, as well as the factors contributing to that score, is presented below. The information below was current as of June 2020.
Karen
Baker
Arkansas
- Partisan Confidence Score:
Indeterminate - Judicial Selection Method:
Elected - Key Factors:
- Received donations from Republican-affiliated individuals or organizations
Partisan Profile
Details:
Baker Received $250 from the Republican Party. Baker donated $2,000 to Democrats in 1998, and $350 to Republicans in 2010.
Bonica and Woodruff campaign finance scores (2012)
In October 2012, political science professors Adam Bonica and Michael Woodruff of Stanford University attempted to determine the partisan ideology of state supreme court justices. They created a scoring system in which a score above 0 indicated a more conservative-leaning ideology, while scores below 0 were more liberal.
Baker received a campaign finance score of -0.63, indicating a liberal ideological leaning. This was more liberal than the average score of -0.48 that justices received in Arkansas.
The study was based on data from campaign contributions by the judges themselves, the partisan leaning of those who contributed to the judges' campaigns, or, in the absence of elections, the ideology of the appointing body (governor or legislature). This study was not a definitive label of a justice, but an academic summary of various relevant factors.[9]
Noteworthy events
Arkansas Supreme Court reiterates deference prohibition (2020)
- See also: State responses to judicial deference
The Arkansas Supreme Court on October 29, 2020, clarified in American Honda Motor Co. v. Walther that state courts should not exercise deference to state agency interpretations of statutes. Instead, the court held that Arkansas state courts should review agency statutory interpretations de novo.[10]
The court’s decision reiterated its May 2020 holding in Meyers v. Yamato Kogyo Co. that the court should determine the meaning of state laws and not defer to state agency interpretations of statutes.[10]
In an opinion by Justice Karen Baker, the court cited its earlier holding in Meyers, stating that “it is the province and duty of this Court to determine what a statute means. In considering the meaning and effect of a statute, we construe it just as it reads, giving the words their ordinary and usually accepted meaning in common language. An unambiguous statute will be interpreted based solely on the clear meaning of the text. But where ambiguity exists, the agency’s interpretation will be one of our many tools used to provide guidance.”[10]
Professional misconduct complaint (2018)
On September 20, 2018, the Arkansas Judicial Discipline and Disciplinary Commission announced charges of ethical misconduct against Arkansas Supreme Court Justices Dan Kemp, Robin Wynne, Courtney Hudson Goodson, Josephine Hart, Karen Baker, and Rhonda Wood. The charges followed a complaint Pulaski County Judge Wendell Griffen filed in April 2017. Griffen alleged the justices did not give him enough time to respond to a ruling removing him from capital punishment cases.[11]
On April 14, 2017, Griffen filed an injunction preventing the execution of seven inmates by capital punishment. He attended a death penalty protest the same day. On April 15, Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge (R) asked the state supreme court to reverse Griffen's injunction and remove him from a case involving the death penalty. The supreme court clerk contacted Griffen about Rutledge's request the afternoon of April 15 and gave Griffen until 9 a.m. April 17 to respond. He was removed from the case after failing to respond by the deadline.[12]
The judicial commission said the justices did not provide Griffen with a sufficient amount of time to respond.[12]
Water fees case (2011)
In September 2011, the Arkansas Supreme Court agreed with a circuit court ruling upholding a fee for residents of Hot Springs. Two taxpayers challenged the water bill fee, stating that the additional monetary requirement was actually a tax, which would need to be approved by the public. Justice Karen Baker differentiated between the two in the opinion, saying, "Taxing power is usually exercised to provide funding for public services at large, while police power is usually exercised to cover the cost of administering a regulatory scheme or providing a service."[13]
State supreme court judicial selection in Arkansas
- See also: Judicial selection in Arkansas
The seven justices on the Arkansas Supreme Court are selected through nonpartisan elections. They compete in nonpartisan general elections—occurring at the same time as the primary elections for other state officials—in which the candidate who receives more than 50 percent of the vote wins the seat. If no candidate garners a majority of the vote, the top two candidates compete in a runoff during the November general election.[14]
The winners are elected to eight-year terms.[14]
Qualifications
To serve on this court, a justice must be:[15]
- licensed to practice law in Arkansas for at least eight years;
- a qualified elector within the geographic area from which chosen.
Chief justice
The court's chief justice is selected by voters at large and serves in that capacity for a full eight-year term.[16]
Vacancies
In the event of a midterm vacancy, an interim judge is selected by the governor to fill the empty seat. If the open seat would have been filled at the next general election if the vacancy did not occur, the appointed justice will serve the remainder of the unexpired term. If the open seat would not have been regularly filled at the next general election, the appointee will serve until the next general election if the vacancy occurred more than four months prior to the election. If the vacancy occurs less than four months prior to the next general election, then the justice will serve until the second succeeding general election. A justice appointed by the governor to serve an unexpired term is ineligible to run for re-election to their seat.[14]
The map below highlights how vacancies are filled in state supreme courts across the country.
See also
External links
|
Candidate Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice |
Officeholder Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice |
Personal |
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Arkansas Online, "2014 Elections Filings, Non-partisan judicial races," accessed March 26, 2014
- ↑ We calculated confidence scores by collecting several data points such as party registration, donations, and previous political campaigns.
- ↑ The five possible confidence scores were: Strong Democrat, Mild Democrat, Indeterminate, Mild Republican, and Strong Republican.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 Arkansas Judiciary, "Arkansas Supreme Court, Justices, Arkansas Associate Justice Karen R. Baker, Position 6," accessed March 26, 2014
- ↑ The City Wire, "Justice Karen Baker Seeking Re-Election," January 1, 2014
- ↑ Arkansas Secretary of State, "Nonpartisan Election Results," May 20, 2014
- ↑ The seven factors were party registration, donations made to partisan candidates, donations made to political parties, donations received from political parties or bodies with clear political affiliation, participation in political campaigns, the partisanship of the body responsible for appointing the justice, and state trifecta status when the justice joined the court.
- ↑ 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.
- ↑ Stanford University, "State Supreme Court Ideology and 'New Style' Judicial Campaigns," October 31, 2012
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 Supreme Court of Arkansas, "American Honda Motor Co. v. Walther," October 29, 2020
- ↑ Arkansas Judicial Discipline & Disciplinary Commission, "Press release," accessed September 20, 2018
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 Talk Business & Politics, "Panel files formal charges against six Arkansas Supreme Court justices over Griffen fight," accessed September 20, 2018
- ↑ Case text, "Morningstar v. Bush," accessed June 21, 2021
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 Arkansas Judiciary, "Arkansas Supreme Court," accessed March 27, 2023 Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; name "ssc" defined multiple times with different content - ↑ Arkansas Bureau of Legislative Services, "Ark. Const. Amendment 80, §16," accessed April 15, 2025
- ↑ Justia, "Arkansas Constitution - Amendment 80 - Qualifications of justices and judges.," accessed March 27, 2023
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Dan Kemp |
Arkansas Supreme Court Chief Justice 2025-Present |
Succeeded by - |
| Preceded by - |
Arkansas Supreme Court Position 6 2011-2024 |
Succeeded by Nicholas Bronni |
Federal courts:
Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: Eastern District of Arkansas, Western District of Arkansas • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: Eastern District of Arkansas, Western District of Arkansas
State courts:
Arkansas Supreme Court • Arkansas Court of Appeals • Arkansas Circuit Courts • Arkansas District Courts • Arkansas City Courts
State resources:
Courts in Arkansas • Arkansas judicial elections • Judicial selection in Arkansas
| ||||||||||
 |
State of Arkansas Little Rock (capital) |
|---|---|
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