Texas GOP Invents Corporate Courts Ready to Do Industry's Bidding

In recent months, corporate groups such as the powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce have faced growing backlash over "judge-shopping," a tactic whereby plaintiffs deliberately select legal venues they believe will produce favorable outcomes.

But as of the beginning of this month, corporations have access to nearly a dozen Texas courts created specifically for the purpose of settling major business cases as well as a statewide panel that will hear appeals from the newly established courts.

"Why bother judge-shopping when you can just invent a new court?" Adrian Shelley, Texas director of Public Citizen, asked in a statement Tuesday.

Texas' Business Court Judicial District, which consists of 11 business courts, is a product of Republican legislation backed by GOP Gov. Greg Abbott, a Big Oil ally tasked with handpicking the courts' judges. A local Chamber of Commerce branch characterized the new courts as "a collaborative effort between the state legislature and the business community."

The state's oil and gas industry lobbied aggressively for the new business district, and their investment appears to have paid off. As journalist Katya Schwenk reported for The Lever last week, "at least five of Abbott's 13 appointees to the business courts, including all three appointees to the appellate court, have worked on behalf of fossil fuel companies."

While it's not the only U.S. state with courts specifically dedicated to corporate cases, Schwenk explained that "Texas' model is different from many other states' business courts."

"The judges are appointed personally by the governor, with virtually no oversight from the legislative branch," Schwenk wrote. "And they only serve two-year terms—in contrast to 12-year terms in Delaware and six-year terms in Nevada—in theory making it easy for Abbott or a successor to quickly replace a judge who doesn't rule in favor of his political interests. Abbott has been pushing for Texas to create such a system for years."

"In the words of one local corporate law firm, the courts were designed to 'preserve Texas' business-friendly culture,' and major corporate actors seem to agree," Schwenk continued. "In the wake of the courts' rollout, SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk announced he was reincorporating the rocket company in Texas; he has since said he is moving SpaceX's headquarters there from California, as well as those of X, formerly Twitter."

"Voters have already chosen the judges they want to head the courts in their communities; Greg Abbott is rejecting that choice by creating new courts that launch with unelected judges he picked."

The new business courts will hear cases involving disputes worth over $10 million, and the 15th Court of Appeals will hear appeals arising from those cases.

As Public Health Watchrecently observed, the creation of the new appeals panel "allows industries and state regulators to bypass the 3rd Court of Appeals, whose six justices are, at the moment, all Democrats." The judges on that court are also elected, unlike the inaugural members of the newly established 15th Court of Appeals.

Shelley of Public Citizen said Wednesday that "there is an ongoing campaign to rip power away from institutions considered unfriendly to the agenda of the state's Republican majority."

"In addition to creating these courts, the legislature also passed H.B. 2627, the Death Star bill, that blocked cities and counties from creating local rules that are best for those communities, including on issues that concern public health, safety, and the environment," said Shelley. "Just as state lawmakers view democratically elected city councils as standing in their way, especially in blue-leaning cities, they don't want the courts checking their power."

"Voters have already chosen the judges they want to head the courts in their communities; Greg Abbott is rejecting that choice by creating new courts that launch with unelected judges he picked," he continued. "These maneuvers are not only a threat to public health and the environment but also undemocratic."

Public Health Watch reported in July that a number of significant climate-related cases are set to move from the 3rd Court of Appeals—which the outlet characterized as generally "receptive to environmentalists' arguments"—to the 15th Court, including "proposed expansions of the ExxonMobil chemical plant in Baytown, near Houston, which experienced a major accident in 2019, and the Valero refinery in Corpus Christi."

Scott Brister, the judge Abbott chose to serve as chief justice of the 15th Court of Appeals, "worked at a law firm known for its specialty in fossil fuel litigation," Schwenk reported last week.

"While an attorney there, Brister, a Republican, led the defense of the oil company BP in litigation over the catastrophic Deepwater Horizon oil spill, one of the worst environmental disasters in history, which released more than 100 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico in 2010," Schwenk noted. "Before then, while serving on the Texas Supreme Court, Brister threw out a major guilty verdict against oil giant ExxonMobil for allegedly poisoning a town's water supply."