The Colorado Bar Association said Tuesday it was concerned about a campaign to unseat the Colorado Supreme Court's chief justice because of her vote to disqualify former President Donald Trump from the state's ballot, calling them "politically charged efforts that target the judiciary's independence."
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The group's relatively small campaign against the chief justice is led by its founder Michael Davis, a former law clerk for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil M. Gorsuch. Davis previously counseled then-Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, on federal judge confirmations, and led confirmation battles for Justices Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh.
Davis, a lawyer and right-wing media personality, told Law360 on Wednesday that Justice Márquez and the other three justices who voted to remove Trump from the ballot made an "outrageous and anti-democratic" decision that disenfranchised hundreds of thousands of Colorado voters. He said the CBA doesn't appear to cite any evidence of threats against justices related to the retention campaign. If people are threatening the justices, they should be prosecuted, Davis said.
He added he was supporting the retention of Justices Berkenkotter and Boatwright, who were appointed by Democratic governors.
"This is not a partisan issue," Davis said. "It's about Chief Justice Monica Márquez's complete lack of judgment. Her ruling is disqualifying. She doesn't respect the will of Colorado voters, so why should she keep her job?"
Davis also appeared on ex-Trump adviser Steve Bannon's podcast to urge Colorado viewers to vote against the chief justice.
"Monica Márquez does not respect democracy, she does not respect the will of American voters, so we need to throw her ass out of office," Davis said on the War Room podcast Oct. 17.
Two state newspapers have also weighed in on the retention fight.
The editorial board of the Denver Gazette has urged voters to vote against all three Colorado justices, citing the paper's reporting on a scandal that led to the censure of former Chief Justice Nathan Coats and a ballot initiative this year to reform the judicial discipline process. The Oct. 20 editorial said all three justices have been "tainted" by transparency and judicial discipline scandals.
The Denver Post's editorial board, meanwhile, penned an Oct. 23 editorial calling for the retention of all three Colorado justices.
The Post editorial called Davis' arguments for rejecting Justice Márquez "utter nonsense," writing that Colorado's high court "did what the nation's top justices were too afraid to do — stand up for the amendment as written, no matter the difficulty that could ensue if enforced by a state court."
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