As one former State Supreme Court Justice explained how he lost his seat, he described “$3 million in untraceable money from corporate interests that supported his opponent. The money, he said, paid for a blizzard of ads that distorted his record with racially tinged images and painted him as a friend of murderers.” — American Bar Association
As of 2019, “Special-interest groups, many with donors the public never knows about, continued to play an outsized role in the financing of elections for state Supreme Courts across the country… More than $39.7 million was spent on four dozen contests for seats on the top courts in 21 states last year, and 27 percent of the money was contributed by advocacy organizations allowed by state and federal laws to keep secret the identities of their benefactors. … By comparison, in no election during the past two decades have these so-called ‘dark money’ organizations accounted for more than 19 percent of all spending in races for Congress. The lack of donor transparency has the obvious potential to obscure all sorts of conflicts of interest for the justices on state Supreme Courts, who have the final say annually on litigation directing billions of dollars into corporate coffers and consumers’ wallets.” — The Fulcrum
“Judicial decisions by elected judges follow the interests of their campaign donors: business groups, political parties, and left- and right-leaning interest groups, among others. …evidence that fundraising pressures influence justices’ decision-making, whether consciously or unconsciously, creating a form of judicial bias. …Once elected, sitting judges face pressure to favor their donors’ preferences in their decisions because they have to worry about their next election and their campaign finance needs. Even judges who are not particularly predisposed to decide in favor of donors might still do so to maintain their financial support.” — State Court Report from Michael S. Kang, formerly of the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court, description of his book with Joanna M. Shepherd, Vice Dean and Thomas Simmons Professor of Law at Emory University School of Law
“In the realm of judicial elections, there exists a pervasive and often overlooked force that threatens the integrity of our justice system: dark money. This term refers to the undisclosed funds funneled into campaigns through various channels, obscuring the true sources of financial support.” – Behind the Robes: Dark Money’s Influence on Judicial Elections
“Since 2000, the Brennan Center’s bi-annual reports, ‘The New Politics of Judicial Elections,’ have documented the alarming rise of money in judicial elections, the dramatic upsurge in special interest group involvement, and the tendency of judicial campaigns to become ‘noisier, nastier and costlier.’” – The Brennan Center