The 2021 decision by the Court of Criminal Appeals said the Texas Constitution barred Paxton from unilaterally prosecuting election fraud.
And Judge Barbara Parker Hervey said Paxton is engaged in “a power grab situation, which is just distasteful, stressful and just not fair.” Stephens’ legal team argued that Paxton’s office had no authority to pursue allegations against the sheriff without the express permission of the Jefferson County district attorney’s office.Paxton decried the ruling, saying it pulled the rug from under his election fraud division, a small but active group within the attorney general’s office that Paxton often touted.
“We didn’t have any ulterior motive in deciding that case. We’ve just followed the law,” Keller said. “They can hang on to some old statute or some interpretation of what the law is, but we follow the constitution,” Herbey said. “We don’t legislate from the bench and we follow the constitution. So that’s as simple as it gets.”The challengers have tiptoed around stating how they would rule should an opportunity arise to overturn the Stephens decision. Ethical guidelines for judicial candidates generally prevent them stating how they would rule on a case.
“When the Stephens case was decided in December 2021, I began to consider running for office again,” Parker said. “Early this fall, I made a firm decision to run.”Finley, a Richardson criminal law attorney, said in an email he was limited in what he could say about the ruling to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest that might require his recusal from a future case, if elected.
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