Supreme Court Opinion Leak Enforces Essential Need to Elect Local Judges who Protect Reproductive Freedoms

LOS ANGELES – Monday’s leaked supreme court decision highlights the imminent threat of the high court rolling back people’s reproductive rights, and the potential criminalization of abortion at the state and local level. This places the urgent need to protect reproductive rights in the hands of local judges.

Currently, courts at the federal, state, and local level are filled with former prosecutors – largely straight, older, white cisgender men; the decision-makers of the court system do not reflect the  breadth of lived experience and expertise present in our communities. This is why, now more than ever, it is essential that we elect progressive women to the courts – especially progressive women of color, whose backgrounds and experience mean they are informed to make ethical decisions on reproductive justice issues.

Ivette Alé-Ferlito, Co-Founder of La Defensa, points out, “Most people are unaware that they have the power to elect judges at the local level. These are low information races that have been dominated by prosecutors that bring with them their nail and hammer approach to the bench. A public defender has never been elected to judicial office in LA County, which directly informs why our County continues to lead the country in incarceration, and most poignantly, the disproportionate incarceration of Black women.”

La Defensa, a Los Angeles based non-profit organization, is the first California organization to focus on the long-ignored work of judicial accountability at the local level. In the past two years, La Defensa launched a public platform where community members and attorneys can rate judges, created a local judicial accountability table, and launched a PAC to elect progressive judges to the LA County Superior Court. The leaked draft brings into focus the urgent need for judicial accountability, and broader transformation of this conservative institution.  

Titilayo Rasaki, Policy and Campaign Strategist at La Defensa, shares, “The judiciary has long stacked power against historically marginalized communities. Monday’s leaked Supreme Court draft opinion is no exception. We cannot allow the power of a conservative judicial branch to criminalize people with uteris’ reproductive care, and to  have the final say on this issue. At the federal level, we need to push our elected representatives to pass legislation to codify the right to an abortion. We must also be active in local elections for trial court judges where progressive candidates are increasingly challenging old guard incumbents’ grip on judicial power.” 

At the local level, judges have tremendous discretion to deny or protect the reproductive rights of marginalized community members, including Black women, who have the highest maternal mortality rate, immigrant and undocumeted people, community members of color, and incarcerated people.

Members of the judiciary have long been complicit in denying people’s reproductive rights, including the eugenicist sterilization of people with uteri.  This has especially impacted Indigenous, Black, and Latinx people, people with disabilities, and incarcerated people. Yet, local judges have the power to divert people out of incarceration, including pregnant people and people with mental health needs. They can also ensure access to reproductive healthcare in the jail system; and they can ensure that individuals who simply cannot afford bail are released and are able to access healthcare in their home community.  

This is why LA Defensa has endorsed four judicial candidates for judge of the LA County Superior Court as the Defenders of Justice. As judges, these candidates will harness their backgrounds as women,  public defenders, and civil rights attorneys to protect the civil rights of Black, Indigenous, and Latinx people, and people of color across issue areas, including in matters relating to reproductive justice. 

Anna Retaino, Candidate for Los Angeles Superior Court, Seat 60, comments, “Public defenders know that the criminalization of any conduct disproportionately affects the poor. And that the effects last longer than the punishment itself. This not only negatively impacts human beings, but is an economic drain on the people affected as well as their communities. County Judges don’t decide federal issues, but all judges can affect people’s lives. Choose wisely.”

Holly Hancock, Candidate for Los Angeles Superior Court, Office 70, noted, “Our neighborhood judges make decisions every day that affect the lives of those in the communities they serve.  They proceed using their own reading of the law.  Background informs behavior. Voters must know that no one is immune to their training, their life experiences and their work.  SCOTUS has made a decision for a nation of women based upon their own experiences. Vote accordingly.”

Jiyoung Carolyn Park, Candidate for Los Angeles Superior Court, Seat 118, remarked, “The lived experience of people making decisions about our bodies and our lives matters. Only 38% of trial court judges in LA County are women. As a daughter of immigrants, a Korean American woman, a renter, and a community lawyer, I will provide a much-needed perspective on the bench.”

Elizabeth Lashley-Haynes, Candidate for Los Angeles Superior Court, Seat 67, shares, “The decisions of the highest court of our land highlight for everyone the importance of the backgrounds of the people who occupy the judicial bench. Diversity of thought and life experiences is critical when people are tasked with making important decisions about the lives and liberty of others. When judges who are used to functioning from positions of power make decisions about things they have very little personal experience with, the results can be devastating.”

Learn More about the Defenders of Justice