North Carolina’s courts have long been a cornerstone of our democracy, meant to stand independent of partisan influence and protect the rights of all people. Yet over the past decade, the judiciary has faced a relentless series of political attacks designed to weaken its independence, shift power, and tilt outcomes in favor of partisan interests.
This timeline documents the steady erosion of judicial safeguards in our state, from the repeal of public financing for judicial elections in 2013, to repeated efforts at court-packing, partisan redistricting, and legislation that strips power from judges, governors, and even the Attorney General. It also highlights recent attempts to intimidate justices, undermine election results, and reshape our courts to serve political agendas rather than the public good.
By tracing these pivotal moments, we can see a clear pattern: an effort to dismantle the checks and balances that protect North Carolinians’ rights. Understanding this history is essential to building public awareness, defending judicial independence, and ensuring that our courts remain fair, impartial, and accountable to the people—not politicians.
February 2025
Senate Bill 58 attack on AG powers
Lawmakers introduced Senate Bill 58, a bill that would strip power from the Attorney General and prevent them from taking legal action against any executive order issued by the President. This bill, which is nothing short of unconstitutional, is an open attempt to put political loyalty over the interests of the people of North Carolina. The language used by Senator Moffitt in the rules committee was chilling—he suggested that if the Attorney General refused to comply with Senate Bill 58, the North Carolina General Assembly would turn the elected position into a “feckless empty shell.” This is the language of authoritarianism—an attempt to silence dissent and eliminate checks on power. This threat is already having an impact. North Carolina’s Attorney General did not join with Attorney Generals from 19 states in a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s unconstitutional Executive Order to reshape U.S. elections.
November 2024
N.C. Supreme Court Contested Election
After losing the N.C. Supreme Court election to Justice Allison Riggs by 734 votes, Judge Jefferson Griffin launched a series of legal maneuvers to challenge the results by seeking to disqualify over 65,000 ballots. While the N.C. Supreme Court eventually ruled that 60,000 incomplete registrations must be counted, the litigation moved into federal court as voters and the League of Women Voters fought to protect military and overseas ballots from being retroactively invalidated. Critics and legal scholars characterized the challenge as an unprecedented assault on democratic norms, likening the attempt to change election rules after the fact to “democratic backsliding.” The dispute finally concluded in April 2025, when a U.S. District Court judge granted summary judgment for Justice Riggs, stating the court would not countenance a strategy to change the rules of the game after it had been played. Consequently, Griffin conceded, and the election was certified for Riggs.
2024
Ethics attack on Justice Anita Earls
A politically motivated ethics complaint was filed by lawmakers against Justice Allison Riggs in the days before the 2024 election. The complaint was widely publicized, disregarding the confidentiality rules for judicial ethics complaints. And it was dismissed after the election.
December 2024
Senate Bill 382 Disaster Relief-3/Budget/Various Law Changes
-
Judicial Vacancies: The governor must replace departing judges with candidates from the same political party.
-
Superior Court Restructuring: Replaces two elected judge seats with legislative appointees.
-
Senior Resident Judges: The Chief Justice now selects these judges, ending the traditional seniority system.
-
Courts Commission Abolished: Eliminates the state group that studies judicial fairness.
-
Litigation Funding: Pays for private lawyers for the Rules Review Commission.
January 2024
N.C. ethics panel drops investigation into Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls
N.C. Supreme Court Justice Anita Earls had sued the North Carolina Judicial Standards Commission to stop an investigation into her for giving media interviews in which she spoke about racial, political, and gender biases at the Supreme Court, where she’s the only Black justice.
October 2023
Senate Bill 259, 2023 Appropriations Act
-
Expanded Legislative Power & Secrecy: Lawmakers granted themselves broad, controversial new investigative powers while shielding their own records from public disclosure.
-
Increased Control Over Courts: The legislature gained the power to appoint special judges to panels hearing state law challenges and took over four seats on the judicial oversight commission.
-
Changes to Court Rules: The state ended automatic appeals based on lower court dissents and now permits high court justices to carry firearms.
August 29, 2023
Justice Earls & First Amendment Rights
Justice Earls responded by suing the Judicial Standards Commission in federal court, arguing that the investigation was chilling her First Amendment right to free speech.
August 29, 2023
Justice Anita Earls Investigated
It was reported that Justice Earls was the target of a Judicial Standards complaint which stems from an interview Earls gave to Law 360 where she commented on the lack of diversity among the Supreme Court’s judicial clerks as well as the elimination of implicit bias training in the court system.
2022
Ending the independent consideration of recusal requests
Ended Chief Justice Beasley’s N.C. Supreme Court recusal reform and decided to allow individual justices to determine when they must recuse themselves, rather than the whole court making the call.
January 20, 2022
Judicial Impeachment
Intel circulated that legislative leadership wanted to impeach judges for rulings they did not like. Impeachment would be a gross overreach and a massive threat to judicial independence. The effort undermines the judiciary as a separate, independent, and co-equal branch of government. This effort was stopped.
2020
Recusal Reform
Justice Cheri Beasley enacted recusal reform administratively, making the whole N.C. Supreme Court decided on recusal instead of leaving it up to the justices themselves.
May 2019
Defanging the Judicial Standards Commission
The state Senate passed a budget that eliminated the Judicial Standards Commission’s executive director position. The Senate’s budget also cut the funding for Chief Justice Beasley’s staff by half. These efforts were eliminated in the final budget.
2018
Senate Bill 814 – Judicial Vacancy Amendment
A constitutional amendment to take away the governor’s ability to appoint judges and justices in a vacancy situation and instead give it to the legislature. This amendment would also apply to newly created judgeships. This was another court-packing scheme. If a Democrat nominee for the Supreme Court did not win in the November 2018 election, then this amendment, if passed, would allow the legislature to come back in a lame-duck session and add two seats to the N.C. Supreme Court and appoint them. It would flip the N.C. Supreme Court from a 4-3 Democrat majority to a 4-3 Republican majority. This amendment would allow the newly appointed justices to stay seated through 2022, thus applying to redistricting lawsuits. Voters defeated this at the ballot box.
November 2017
Eliminate Judicial Elections
Attempts were made by legislative leadership who wished to push for the legislative appointment of judges. This would put judicial selection primarily in the hands of the legislature and can only be accomplished by a constitutional amendment approved by voters. This attack was stopped.
October 20, 2017
Attempt to Reduce Judicial Terms to 2 Years
Senate Bill 698 is a constitutional amendment to eliminate all duly elected judges and justices as of December 2018, putting new two-year terms up for office in the 2018 general election. The amendment would reduce judicial terms from four years for district court judges and eight years for superior court judges, the Court of Appeals judges, and Supreme Court justices down to just two years. North Carolina would be the first state in the nation to require statewide judges to run every two years. This attack was stopped.
October 17, 2017
Cancel 2018 Judicial Primaries
Senate Bill 656 canceled the judicial primaries for 2018, making general election ballots longer and more confusing. The bill was vetoed by Governor Cooper, but the veto was overridden.
September 2017
Judicial Redistricting
House Bill 717 redrew district court, superior court, and prosecutorial districts. These were drawn in secret, behind closed doors, and without public input. Many argue these districts were gerrymandered to create favorable elections for Republican judges. It has been roughly 50 years since the last full redraw, with minor adjustments made over time. These districts need to be redrawn, and many propose supporting a better process, as laid out in House Bill 124, a study committee to develop better districts.
April 2017
House Bill 239 – Reduction Of Court Of Appeals From 15 Judges To 12
Despite widespread opposition and a gubernatorial veto, House Bill 239 reduced the Court of Appeals from 15 judges to 12, because Republicans feared the incoming Democratic governor would be able to fill three vacancies that would come open during his term. Judge Douglas McCullough, a Republican, resigned early in protest of the bill, allowing Democratic Governor Roy Cooper to appoint his replacement, former Court of Appeals Judge John Arrowood. After this stunt, the legislature returned the Court of Appeals to 15 members.
March 2017
House Bill 100 – Judicial Races Made Partisan
Despite opposition and a gubernatorial veto, House Bill 100 turned the election of trial judges into partisan races. North Carolina is the first state in 100 years to return to the widely-considered bad policy of partisan judicial elections.
March 2017 — August 2017
Bills Limiting Governor’s Powers
Several proposed bills in North Carolina aimed to transfer the governor’s judicial appointment powers to the General Assembly or political parties. These attempts to increase legislative influence over the judiciary, which critics called unconstitutional, all failed to become law.
December 2016
Senate Bill 4 – Statewide Judicial Elections Made Partisan
Made judicial elections for the state Supreme Court and Court of Appeals partisan, added a layer to the appellate process, and eliminated a right of appeal directly to the state’s high court for some cases. North Carolina is the first state in 100 years to return to the widely-considered bad policy of partisan judicial elections.
December 2016
“Court Packing”
Post-election rumors spread of a “court-packing” scheme. In December 2016, a special session was called under the guise of helping fire and flood victims. It was quietly understood that this would be an opportunity to gut the power of the incoming Democratic governor and “pack” the state Supreme Court by adding two more justices, who would be appointed by the outgoing Republican governor. After a massive outcry, the plan disappeared. One week later, the public learned from a press release that Governor Pat McCrory had “also successfully worked to deter any efforts to expand the composition of our Supreme Court.
June 2015
N.C. Supreme Court Retention Election Bill
In 2015, the North Carolina General Assembly passed a law creating retention elections for the state Supreme Court. This meant incumbent judges no longer had to face challengers. Instead, voters would have a choice between re-electing incumbents or asking them to resign. In the event of resignations, the governor would choose interim judges who would serve for two years before running for election. The law was challenged, and the newly created three-member Superior Court panel ruled against retention elections, noting that the state constitution mandates the election of judges and that retention elections do not fit the constitution’s parameters. The panel threw out the entire law, including party labels for state Supreme Court elections.
November 4, 2014
N.C. Supreme Court Elections
The 2014 Supreme Court elections did not go as conservatives had hoped, even though it was the first election without judicial public financing. Three of the four Supreme Court justices who were elected did not align with conservatives. Because the balance of power for the state Supreme Court would be up in the air with the 2016 elections, the legislature sought to change the rules once again.
November 4, 2014
Three-Judge Panel Ruling
The General Assembly passed a law requiring that a panel of three Superior Court judges, instead of one judge, must rule on the validity of laws it passes. This stopped plaintiffs from judge-shopping, but some argued this new three-judge panel appointed by the Chief Justice, made up of judges from across the state, was created because the legislature hoped for different outcomes when its laws were challenged.
June 11, 2013
Public Financing Repealed
After 10 years of success, with 65% of North Carolinians supporting it and 80% of judicial candidates participating, public financing for judicial races was repealed in 2013, allowing big money more influence over our fair and impartial courts.
