Will gay marriage decision cost Iowa justices their jobs? | San Diego Gay and Lesbian News
Marsha Ternus, the chief justice of the Iowa Supreme Court, is unopposed in her bid for reelection this November. It will probably be the toughest campaign of her life.
Ternus, along with two of her colleagues on the court, find themselves in a situation rarely encountered by appointed judges in the United States. They are the targets of an organized effort to turn a judicial retention election — a simple “yes” or “no” vote on whether an initially appointed judge should remain on the bench — into a political battle.
The election is drawing national money and attention, and already has more in common with a contested race for governor or attorney general than it does with the ordinarily mundane process of voting on a sitting judge’s record, with no other names on the ballot.