Three seats on the all-Republican Texas Supreme Court will be decided this year – the first statewide judicial elections since the overturning of Roe v. Wade in 2022. Democrats are targeting the three incumbents this year – Judges John Devine , Jane Bland and Jimmy Blacklock – hoping that bipartisan backlash over abortion rulings will give them their first victory on the bench since 1994.

Polls have shown that Texas voters are generally dissatisfied with the strictness of the state’s abortion laws. But experts say Democrats face hurdles Tuesday given the lack of attention voters pay to the Texas Supreme Court, the state’s highest civil body. Since January 1, Bland and Blacklock have also raised and spent more than three times as much as their opponents, judges Bonnie Lee Goldstein and DaSean Jones.

There are signs that Devine could be more vulnerable than his Republican colleagues in his race against Harris County District Court Judge Christine Weems. He was the only judge with a primary challenger this year and barely survived a heated campaign that focused, among other things, on ethics issues: his absence from half of the court’s arguments last year. Devine has followed Weems in both fundraising and spending this cycle.

Devine has been a fixture in conservative Christian lawsuits for years, having called the separation of church and state a “myth” and, as a Supreme Court nominee in 2011, claiming to have been arrested 37 times during anti-abortion protests in the 1980s. Earlier this year, the Tribune reported that Devine had not withdrawn from a high-profile sex abuse lawsuit against Southern Baptist leader Paul Pressler, despite working for Pressler’s law firm at the time of the alleged assaults. Last month, the Tribune also reported that Devine spent years overseeing the trust of an elderly millionaire with dementia — despite Texas’ ban on judges filling such fiduciary roles for non-family members. Devine has denied all allegations and said the woman regarded him as a son for decades.

The Texas Court of Appeals has traditionally been overshadowed by the state Supreme Court, its civil counterpart in Texas’ bifurcated court system. But this year, a series of political battles over the death penalty and voter fraud investigations have put the all-Republican judiciary in an unexpected spotlight — and created a divisive moment for voters, who will decide between three parties on Tuesday. judges backed by Attorney General Ken Paxton, or their Democratic challengers.

The surprise drama of this year’s race dates back to 2021, when the court ruled that Paxton’s office must get permission from prosecutors to prosecute cases of alleged voter fraud. Furious, Paxton vowed revenge and launched a full-on electoral blitz that decisively took down three sitting justices during the GOP primaries in March.

On the ballot Tuesday are the three Paxton-backed candidates — David Schenck, Gina Parker and Lee Finley — and their respective Democratic challengers, Holly Taylor, Nancy Mulder and Chika Anyiam.

In addition, the Court of Criminal Appeals has recently come under scrutiny for its role in the high-profile political fight over Robert Roberson, a death row inmate whose scheduled execution was halted earlier this month by a bipartisan group of members of the Texas House. All three of the court’s outgoing judges voted to allow Roberson’s execution to proceed. But if even one of the court’s new judges appears to take a different position, it could open the door for a rehearing. Those chances will likely diminish if Republican candidates emerge victorious next week.

— Robert Downen