Holly Hansen - Reporter, The Texan - Joins Houston Morning News

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, six twenty three. Now again Bob Franz in for
Jimmy along with Schera. We've been focusing on the presidential race. Obviously,
senate races are huge in Texas and around the country,
but judicial races can be just as important. In joining
us now to talk about some very important appellate seats
that are open in the southeastern Texas region. Holly Hansom,
reporter for the Texas Holly, good.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Morning, Good morning, So let's talk.

Speaker 1 (00:23):
A little bit about this. Tell us about the state
control of state appellate courts with jurisdiction over this region.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Yeah, so you were talking about looking for change this
election season. There is a slew of Republican candidates and
some big donors who would like to see some change
in these appellate courts. And what's happening is you have
the First and Fourteenth Course of Appeals that are centered
in Houston, but they cover a ten county region and
they hear appeals for every case criminal, civil, family, juvenile.

(00:56):
So if you have any contact with the court system,
there's a good chance that you're going to have contact
with these appeals courts. The problem is, or the criticism
is that they've been pretty slow to turn around appeals.
Some of the appeals have languished in that court for
five years or more without a resolution. And some of

(01:16):
these judges are part of that Beto wave that's more
criminal justice reform minded and a little more lenient on
repeat offenders being released on bond and so forth. To
some of these Republicans have united together to create a
front facing campaign. There are three ladies, Judge Marisa ant

(01:37):
or former judge I should say, a defense attorney Tanya
McLaughlin and civil attorney Katie Bowman. They've unveiled a joint
website and advertising campaign that features Jim Mackrismack Macking veil
and they're running hard for these seas well.

Speaker 3 (01:55):
Liking judges has always been a problem because they're not
known as people, and the problem has always been who
are they? What do they stand for? And it makes
a difference when they band together like this and pool
their resources as well as their endorsements.

Speaker 2 (02:14):
That's a great point share because few people pay attention
to this. They're all paying attention to the presidential races
they should, or the senatece rate, but these are really
important races. They have a direct impact on a lot
of lives and say, you've got these three gals. It's
a pretty neat ad that they've put out there, and
they've got some big financial backers that aren't funding them directly.

(02:37):
But the Judicial Fairness Pack race eight million dollars in
the last quarter. Some of those donations came from Elon
Musk and other big donors. Some big companies each donated
a million dollars. Because there's a lot of concern about
how the court system is working in the state of Texas.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
And I was used too. I always thought the Fourteenth
Court was largely civil cases, and you know, to learn
that it's also criminal cases. When did that come about?
Because we've got a criminal Court of Appeals.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Well, so there's actually three levels. So you have your
local state district courts, and then any appeals go to
these appeals courts and Harris County. That Houston region is
so big that there's actually two courts of appeals, but
they completely overlap and they do hear every single appeal.

(03:28):
The ten counties are kind of this southeast region, and
then above them is the Court of Criminal Appeals and
the Supreme Court of Texas. But those two top courts
only hear about ten percent of cases. They don't take
up every case that gets the appeal to them, and
so these appeals courts are kind of the last word

(03:50):
in most cases.

Speaker 3 (03:54):
Pretty important.

Speaker 1 (03:55):
Then it is indeed that, yeah, these are things that
share I think you said every well too. Judges aren't
usually regarded as people to persons. It's a it's a
it's a strange phenomenon in elections.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
Bow Well, and there's so many judge ships. I mean,
you go down the ballot and he's like, who are
all these people? Because they don't have the resources in
order to be able to mount the campaigns and they
can't get the attention and the TV time and all
of that. And straight party ticket voting is out now
in Texas, so you have to go through one by one,
you have to.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
And that takes an effort, but a lot of voters
don't want to don't want to put forth that effort, unfortunately,
but really important information. One thing they can do is
read the article by Holly Hanson and the text and Holly,
thanks so much for the time, great stuff. We appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (04:35):
You've got thanks for having me on