Tennessee Democratic Leader Dismayed By Slatery Appointment

House Minority Leader Craig Fitzhugh met with reporters on Monday to discuss what he sees as a partisan attorney general appointment. Credit: File Photo

House Minority Leader Craig Fitzhugh expressed dismay at what he sees as the state’s high court caving to political pressure in its attorney general appointment. The court chose Herb Slatery, a Republican, to succeed Democratic Bob Cooper, a decision Fitzhugh portrayed as a betrayal.

The news follows a failed campaign spearheaded by Lt. Gov. Ron Ramsey to push out three Democratic judges from the five-member bench. Ramsey, along with other special interest groups, spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to replace the three Democrats, with the ultimate goal of landing a Republican attorney general.

Despite how voters turned down Ramsey’s pitch, the justices on the state’s high court gave Ramsey what he wanted, according to Fitzhugh.

“The justices capitulated,” Fitzhugh said. “And validated what he was trying to do, politicizing our state’s judiciary.”

At an announcement on Monday, the Supreme Court Justices did not offer an explanation for picking Slatery, nor did they elaborate on why they decided to not re-appoint Cooper.

Fitzhugh said voters showed in August that they prefer an impartial judiciary.

Yet no matter the appointment, critics were sure to say politics played a role, given the money that was pumped into the August race from both sides.

“It’s a disappointing day for a man who, without question, has done an exception job,” Fitzhugh said. “The Supreme Court ran to be retained, they were retained, and I think they made an error when they did not look at what Attorney General Cooper had done and failed to retain him, and instead fired him for partisan purposes.”