Here’s some rank speculation based on no inside information whatsoever: Justice Goodwin Liu might run for California Attorney General next year. If he does, he would likely need to first resign from the Supreme Court.
First, why the speculation? Justice Liu wanted to be the state’s Attorney General in 2021 when Governor Newsom was looking to fill the vacancy in the office caused by Xavier Becerra’s appointment to President Biden’s cabinet. Liu garnered a number of public endorsements for the position, including from three retired Supreme Court justices (see here, here, and here), before Newsom nominated current Attorney General Rob Bonta.
Would Liu run against the incumbent Bonta, a friend and law school classmate whom Liu praised when Bonta was chosen? Probably not. But, although Bonta did take himself out of the governor’s race back in February, he is now said to be “strongly” reconsidering that decision.
Second, if Bonta runs for governor, leaving an open field for Attorney General, and Liu decides to jump into the race, would Liu have to resign from the Supreme Court? It looks like it.
Article VI, section 17, of the California Constitution provides, “A judge of a court of record . . . during the term for which the judge was selected is ineligible for . . . public office other than judicial employment or judicial office.” There’s an exception, but for some reason it’s only for trial judges, who “may . . . become eligible for election to other public office by taking a leave of absence without pay prior to filing a declaration of candidacy.”
If Liu resigns from the court, there don’t seem to be any other legal barriers to his candidacy.
Liu has over nine years left on “the term for which [he] was selected”. Does he have to wait until the end of that term to become eligible for a non-judicial public office? Probably not. As one Court of Appeal concluded, “Section 17 renders only a sitting judge ineligible for other public office or public employment during the term for which that judge was selected. Thus, it does not prohibit any person who has resigned or retired from a judicial office . . . from immediately commencing public service in another capacity.” (Gilbert v. Chiang (2014) 227 Cal.App.4th 537, 546.)
Government Code section 12503 requires the Attorney General to have “been admitted to practice before the Supreme Court of the state for a period of at least five years immediately preceding that person’s election or appointment to this office.” Liu was admitted to the bar in 1999, but, like all judges, article VI, section 9, suspended his membership in the State Bar once he took the bench, which was in 2011. His inactive status shouldn’t be a problem, however. (See Early v. Becerra (2020) 47 Cal.App.5th 325, 329 [“The phrase ‘admitted to practice’ refers to the event of admission to the bar and the status of being admitted, and does not require engagement in the ‘actual’ or ‘active’ practice of law”].)
If Justice Liu does run for Attorney General, you heard it here first. If not, forget you ever read this.
