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Nevada Supreme Court elections, 2022
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The terms of two Nevada Supreme Court justices expired on January 1, 2023. The two seats were up for nonpartisan election on November 8, 2022. A primary was scheduled for June 14, 2022. The primary election was not needed after only one candidate filed for each seat on the ballot. The filing deadline was March 18, 2022.[1]
Nevada 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 election results
Seat A: Hardesty vacancy
General election
General election for Nevada Supreme Court Seat A
Linda M. Bell won election in the general election for Nevada Supreme Court Seat A on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Linda M. Bell (Nonpartisan) | 75.9 | 666,535 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 24.1 | 211,792 | ||
| Total votes: 878,327 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
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Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Linda M. Bell advanced from the primary for Nevada Supreme Court Seat A.
Seat E: Parraguirre's seat
General election
General election for Nevada Supreme Court Seat E
Incumbent Ron Parraguirre won election in the general election for Nevada Supreme Court Seat E on November 8, 2022.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Ron Parraguirre (Nonpartisan) | 74.5 | 651,496 |
| Other/Write-in votes | 25.5 | 222,899 | ||
| Total votes: 874,395 | |||
| = 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. | ||||
Nonpartisan primary election
The primary election was canceled. Incumbent Ron Parraguirre advanced from the primary for Nevada Supreme Court Seat E.
Justices not on the ballot
Voting information
- See also: Voting in Nevada
About the Nevada Supreme Court
- See also: Nevada Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of Nevada is the court of last resort in the state of Nevada. The court reviews appeals from the district courts and assigns cases to the Nevada Court of Appeals. Nevada's three-judge court of appeals was established in January 2015. Before that time, the supreme court heard all appeals in the state.[2] The supreme court hears cases in Carson City and Las Vegas.[3]
Political composition
This was the political composition of the supreme court heading into the 2022 election. Justices on the Nevada Supreme Court are elected to their seats, and replacements are appointed by the governor in the case of midterm vacancies.
| ■ Elissa Cadish | Elected in 2018 | |
| ■ Douglas Herndon | Elected in 2020 | |
| ■ James Hardesty | Elected in 2004, 2010, and 2016 | |
| ■ Ron Parraguirre | Elected in 2004, 2010, and 2016 | |
| ■ Kris Pickering | Elected in 2008, 2014, and 2020 | |
| ■ Vacant | Elected in 2018 | |
| ■ Lidia Stiglich | Appointed by Gov. Brian Sandoval (R) in 2016; elected in 2018 |
Selection
The seven justices of the Nevada Supreme Court are elected to six-year terms in nonpartisan elections. To serve additional terms, justices must run for re-election. In the event of a midterm vacancy, the Nevada Commission on Judicial Selection solicits and screens applicants to fill the judgeship. It makes recommendations to the governor, who appoints a mid-term replacement to serve until the next general election. If re-elected, the appointee serves out the remainder of the predecessor's unexpired term.[4]
Qualifications
To serve on the Nevada Supreme Court, a justice must be:
- a qualified elector;
- a state resident for two years;
- at least 25 years old;
- licensed and admitted to practice law in Nevada;
- a licensed attorney for 15 years with at least two years in Nevada.[4]
Selection of the chief justice
The supreme court selects its chief justice by seniority.
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: 91
- Percentage of cases with a unanimous ruling: 87.9% (80)
- Justice most often writing the majority opinion: Justice Lidia Stiglich (23)
- Per curiam decisions: 2
- Concurring opinions: 0
- Dissenting opinions: 11
- Justice with most dissenting opinions: Justices Elissa Cadish and Lidia Stiglich (3 and 3)
For the study's full set of findings in Nevada, 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[5]
- 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.[6]
Nevada had a Court Balance Score of 0, indicating Split 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
- ↑ Nevada Secretary of State, "2022 Election Information," accessed February 3, 2022
- ↑ Supreme Court of Nevada, ""Overview of the appellate courts,"" accessed October 27, 2015
- ↑ Supreme Court of Nevada, ""Overview of the Supreme Court,"" accessed January 29, 2015
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 American Judicature Society, "Methods of Judicial Selection: Nevada," archived October 3, 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:
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals • U.S. District Court: District of Nevada • U.S. Bankruptcy Court: District of Nevada
State courts:
Nevada Supreme Court • Nevada Court of Appeals • Nevada District Courts • Nevada Justice Courts • Nevada Municipal Courts • Clark County Family Court, Nevada
State resources:
Courts in Nevada • Nevada judicial elections • Judicial selection in Nevada
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