By Ben Solis
Gongwer News Service
Three of the four nominees for the Michigan Supreme Court in 2024 shared how they’d view cases through the lens of their judicial philosophies and highlighted stark differences in their approaches to the law during a candidate forum held Thursday.
The League of Women Voters invited Justice Kyra Harris Bolden, law professor Kimberly Thomas, Branch Circuit Judge Patrick O’Grady and Rep. Andrew Fink (R-Hillsdale) to a forum for the public and members of the media to learn more about the candidates.
Bolden, Thomas and O’Grady appeared at the forum to share how they would decide cases before the state’s highest court. Fink did not attend.
The incumbent Bolden is seeking reelection to her current seat as the Democratic Party nominee and will face O’Grady, the Republican nominee, in the fall to fill the remaining four years of former Justice Bridget McCormack’s term. Democratic nominee Thomas and the GOP-nominated Fink will square off for a full eight-year term to replace retiring Justice David Viviano in November.
Judy Florian, vice president of voter services for the League, said Thursday’s event was not meant to be a debate, but a way to educate voters on the candidates, their backgrounds and views.
O’Grady said he’s been on Branch County’s circuit bench for over 15 years, handling more than 14,000 cases and deciding on major criminal prosecutions and trial work, as well as civil litigation. Prior to becoming a judge, he worked as a prosecuting attorney. O’Grady was also a Department of State Police trooper, a field training officer and a legal trainer before going to law school.
Thomas said she is an experienced trial and appellate attorney and now a law professor at the University of Michigan Law School, where she teaches students in ethical practice. She’s also the director of the school’s Juvenile Justice Clinic. As an attorney for 25 years, who graduated from Harvard Law School, Thomas said she’s litigated hundreds of cases in Michigan’s trial and appellate courts, as well as before justices of the high court.
Bolden, who has served for about two years on the bench, said she’s authored eight majority opinions and has been proud of her work. She was previously a state representative who was able to get five bills signed into law and served on the House Judiciary Committee during her time in office. Bolden was also a civil litigator at a Detroit law firm and has leveraged her experience as a litigator and a lawmaker as a Supreme Court justice.
When asked why she became an attorney, Thomas said it was an idea born out of her former job as a reporter for The Detroit News, where she worked until 1995 when her union and the five other unions for the Detroit newspapers went on strike.
“I decided that, given my family background and the impact that I saw that the law had on people’s lives, I wanted to go to law school and serve the people of my state,” Thomas said. “So, I went from the picket line in Detroit to Harvard Law School, where I graduated magna cum laude in 1999 and have tried to for the last 25 years be a lawyer that worked in service of people.”
Bolden went to law school after attending Grand Valley State University. She initially received a degree in psychology and had no interest in the legal field but changed her mind after she learned the story of her great grandfather, Jesse Lee Bond, who was lynched by a mob in Arlington, Tennessee, in 1939. It is a story that Bolden told voters on the campaign trail when she ran for the Supreme Court in 2022, and it remains a crucial aspect of her reasoning to remain on the bench.
“I was moved by that story of my family history, and I wanted families to see justice in a way that my family had not seen justice, because we know that government sanction and justice was the norm in this country at some point,” Bolden said. “I was very compelled to make sure that I was a part of the justice system on the right side of justice. I went to law school to make sure that I could be a part of the change that I wished to see in the world.”
O’Grady said that delivering justice has been an aim of his since he was a young child. He wanted to be a state trooper and became one, working all sorts of assignments in posts across the metro Detroit area and Washtenaw County. O’Grady said he truly understood the call to service in that role and wanted to advance to an investigator position. He went to law school, graduated, got that job, but went back to law school to enhance his knowledge of criminal law.
“I returned back to a county courthouse, where I joined the prosecutor’s office, and remained there for just about eight years, trying cases in the circuit court, the district court, and also the family division of the circuit court, many times located in the probate court, which protects children in very violent, horrible environments for abuse and neglect,” O’Grady said. “And that’s how I really got led to become a lawyer. It was simply the advancement of going through the law and understanding what incredible service that is to protect families, to protect people’s rights and protect Michigan.”
Asked who inspired them to be a judge, Bolden said she had too many to name but singled out Judge Johnny Murphy of the Wayne Circuit Court, whom she clerked for just after becoming barred.
“When I called him to tell him that I was running for Michigan Supreme Court, the first thing he said was, ‘that’s perfect for you. And so, through our relationship of going back and forth and not always agreeing but doing the research and the writing and developing a relationship where he didn’t just treat me like a staffer, he treated me as someone whose voice was valued,” Bolden said. “I found so much inspiration in that mentorship and for him to essentially bless my running for Michigan Supreme Court really meant a lot to me.
He was my first real mentor in the legal field, and I will forever be grateful for his service to the state of Michigan and having the opportunity to serve as his judicial law clerk.”
O’Grady also said he had numerous influences, including some in the State Police who he looked up to, but said Branch District Judge David Coyle was one who elevated his view of what it meant to be a sound judge. O’Grady said he respected his demeanor of impartiality, and he became a great mentor. The judge also mentioned former Supreme Court Justice Robert Young Jr.
“I still remember once sitting down at a restaurant, him, with other judges sitting around a round table, discussing his judicial philosophy and what he expected from all of us younger judges, as well as being part of the Michigan judiciary,” O’Grady said. “It was overwhelming to just have that incredible cultivation of poise, humility, but at the same point in time, a true understanding of the rule of law and its application and what he expected from all of us.”
Thomas noted the mentorship of 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge R. Guy Cole, with whom she clerked after law school. Thomas said he demanded that her research was impeccable and made sure she understood the record completely.
“He just really did not take any subpar work. I appreciated that, and I think that’s really important on our state Supreme Court to get it right. He also was on, of course, a bench of other judges, and at the time, when that he became the chief judge, there was some acrimony between some of the judges, and he worked really hard internally to make sure that there was a collegial bench,” Thomas said. “There was a bench that represented the people well, and they had a good working relationship, and I think that’s important on a bench of seven justices.”
That said, the most likely question voters might have about the candidates surrounds their judicial philosophies and how that would temper their view of cases before them.
Thomas said her philosophy was hard one to sum up in a few words but it was informed by her professorship.
“What I require of my law students is what I would require of me as a Supreme Court justice. You start with the text of the law or the text of the Constitution, that you know all of the preceding cases and the precedent that come before, and adhere to those,” she said.
“That you apply the law fairly and do 100 percent of your research. Making sure that we have thorough and careful decisions that act with integrity, and applying the law is what I demand of my students and what I would expect of myself on the Michigan Supreme Court.”
Bolden said she didn’t have a specific philosophy because that kind of thinking puts judges in boxes. Instead, she talked about her approach to finding the right answer.
“We have briefs, we have research, we have oral arguments. I talk to my law clerks, and I talked to the other justices. There are seven of us, and we see things in different ways, and it takes a majority to have a ruling. There’s a lot more collaboration at the Supreme Court level than people realize,” she said. “It’s important to take all the information that you have available to you, to talk to different people, to listen to oral arguments, to be very, very thoughtful and considerate when making these very important decisions for Michiganders. And that’s how I approach each and every case – with an openness that each case is not the same, also knowing that I have something to learn with every single case, that each case requires thoughtfulness and consideration for its uniqueness.”
O’Grady said his 15 years on the bench have helped him develop his own philosophy, which is less focused on the particular cases before him and based on decorum and an understanding that everyone before him is treated with respectfulness and kindness. He also said the role requires one not to be a judicial activist or push the law where they think it should go.
“You simply have to apply the law. The rule of law is what it is,” he said. “It’s created by the legislatures, presented to the court. Also understanding the textual interpretation of both the Constitution and statutory structure needs to be applied. The law needs to be applied to the facts through the lens of the law. And you must do so methodically at the same point in time.”
As to how politics and political pressure affect decisions, Bolden said it was less about pressure than it was about working together and having a robust discussion.
“We don’t always agree, but I think that’s part of getting the right answer, having robust discussion, having disagreement. And there have been times where a justice has changed my mind, and there has been a time where I’ve changed the justice’s mind,” Bolden said.
“The current court, I believe, is dedicated to the rule of law, even though we see things differently sometimes, and we are all focused on just getting the answer right.”
O’Grady said it is necessary to understand the political pressures but not let them enter the decision-making realm.
“As well as when you’re interacting with your other colleagues, it’s important to put politics at the door, whatever it is,” he said. “All people are political in nature or another, and just like when we talk to a jury, we ask them that we let them know that every human being has a bias. The question is whether you can put that bias aside and be able to answer these legal issues before you in a very impartial manner. … It’s not about being enemies, it’s about inspiring the thought of your colleagues, and being willing and open to listen to their point. Sometimes both of you come in with one view, and by the time you’re done with the conversation, you both come out with a totally different view, which is really kind of exciting. That is the development of the law.”
Thomas said that so many of the cases before the high court are not usually acrimonious nor reported in headlines, and those are the cases where the court is doing their best to resolve an important dispute or question of law.
“They aren’t seen as political questions, they are just practical questions that need to get answered to give guidance to the people of our state,” she said. “There’s so much work of the court that is not even touching a political lens. As a professor, my job is seeking things from all sides and making sure I understand all sides of an issue, and that I’m pushing others to see all sides of an issue. I think that’s a really important feature of a Supreme Court justice, to be able to make sure they are appreciated where everyone’s positions are at, and to make sure they take those in good faith and into consideration.”
Gongwer News Service
Three of the four nominees for the Michigan Supreme Court in 2024 shared how they’d view cases through the lens of their judicial philosophies and highlighted stark differences in their approaches to the law during a candidate forum held Thursday.
The League of Women Voters invited Justice Kyra Harris Bolden, law professor Kimberly Thomas, Branch Circuit Judge Patrick O’Grady and Rep. Andrew Fink (R-Hillsdale) to a forum for the public and members of the media to learn more about the candidates.
Bolden, Thomas and O’Grady appeared at the forum to share how they would decide cases before the state’s highest court. Fink did not attend.
The incumbent Bolden is seeking reelection to her current seat as the Democratic Party nominee and will face O’Grady, the Republican nominee, in the fall to fill the remaining four years of former Justice Bridget McCormack’s term. Democratic nominee Thomas and the GOP-nominated Fink will square off for a full eight-year term to replace retiring Justice David Viviano in November.
Judy Florian, vice president of voter services for the League, said Thursday’s event was not meant to be a debate, but a way to educate voters on the candidates, their backgrounds and views.
O’Grady said he’s been on Branch County’s circuit bench for over 15 years, handling more than 14,000 cases and deciding on major criminal prosecutions and trial work, as well as civil litigation. Prior to becoming a judge, he worked as a prosecuting attorney. O’Grady was also a Department of State Police trooper, a field training officer and a legal trainer before going to law school.
Thomas said she is an experienced trial and appellate attorney and now a law professor at the University of Michigan Law School, where she teaches students in ethical practice. She’s also the director of the school’s Juvenile Justice Clinic. As an attorney for 25 years, who graduated from Harvard Law School, Thomas said she’s litigated hundreds of cases in Michigan’s trial and appellate courts, as well as before justices of the high court.
Bolden, who has served for about two years on the bench, said she’s authored eight majority opinions and has been proud of her work. She was previously a state representative who was able to get five bills signed into law and served on the House Judiciary Committee during her time in office. Bolden was also a civil litigator at a Detroit law firm and has leveraged her experience as a litigator and a lawmaker as a Supreme Court justice.
When asked why she became an attorney, Thomas said it was an idea born out of her former job as a reporter for The Detroit News, where she worked until 1995 when her union and the five other unions for the Detroit newspapers went on strike.
“I decided that, given my family background and the impact that I saw that the law had on people’s lives, I wanted to go to law school and serve the people of my state,” Thomas said. “So, I went from the picket line in Detroit to Harvard Law School, where I graduated magna cum laude in 1999 and have tried to for the last 25 years be a lawyer that worked in service of people.”
Bolden went to law school after attending Grand Valley State University. She initially received a degree in psychology and had no interest in the legal field but changed her mind after she learned the story of her great grandfather, Jesse Lee Bond, who was lynched by a mob in Arlington, Tennessee, in 1939. It is a story that Bolden told voters on the campaign trail when she ran for the Supreme Court in 2022, and it remains a crucial aspect of her reasoning to remain on the bench.
“I was moved by that story of my family history, and I wanted families to see justice in a way that my family had not seen justice, because we know that government sanction and justice was the norm in this country at some point,” Bolden said. “I was very compelled to make sure that I was a part of the justice system on the right side of justice. I went to law school to make sure that I could be a part of the change that I wished to see in the world.”
O’Grady said that delivering justice has been an aim of his since he was a young child. He wanted to be a state trooper and became one, working all sorts of assignments in posts across the metro Detroit area and Washtenaw County. O’Grady said he truly understood the call to service in that role and wanted to advance to an investigator position. He went to law school, graduated, got that job, but went back to law school to enhance his knowledge of criminal law.
“I returned back to a county courthouse, where I joined the prosecutor’s office, and remained there for just about eight years, trying cases in the circuit court, the district court, and also the family division of the circuit court, many times located in the probate court, which protects children in very violent, horrible environments for abuse and neglect,” O’Grady said. “And that’s how I really got led to become a lawyer. It was simply the advancement of going through the law and understanding what incredible service that is to protect families, to protect people’s rights and protect Michigan.”
Asked who inspired them to be a judge, Bolden said she had too many to name but singled out Judge Johnny Murphy of the Wayne Circuit Court, whom she clerked for just after becoming barred.
“When I called him to tell him that I was running for Michigan Supreme Court, the first thing he said was, ‘that’s perfect for you. And so, through our relationship of going back and forth and not always agreeing but doing the research and the writing and developing a relationship where he didn’t just treat me like a staffer, he treated me as someone whose voice was valued,” Bolden said. “I found so much inspiration in that mentorship and for him to essentially bless my running for Michigan Supreme Court really meant a lot to me.
He was my first real mentor in the legal field, and I will forever be grateful for his service to the state of Michigan and having the opportunity to serve as his judicial law clerk.”
O’Grady also said he had numerous influences, including some in the State Police who he looked up to, but said Branch District Judge David Coyle was one who elevated his view of what it meant to be a sound judge. O’Grady said he respected his demeanor of impartiality, and he became a great mentor. The judge also mentioned former Supreme Court Justice Robert Young Jr.
“I still remember once sitting down at a restaurant, him, with other judges sitting around a round table, discussing his judicial philosophy and what he expected from all of us younger judges, as well as being part of the Michigan judiciary,” O’Grady said. “It was overwhelming to just have that incredible cultivation of poise, humility, but at the same point in time, a true understanding of the rule of law and its application and what he expected from all of us.”
Thomas noted the mentorship of 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge R. Guy Cole, with whom she clerked after law school. Thomas said he demanded that her research was impeccable and made sure she understood the record completely.
“He just really did not take any subpar work. I appreciated that, and I think that’s really important on our state Supreme Court to get it right. He also was on, of course, a bench of other judges, and at the time, when that he became the chief judge, there was some acrimony between some of the judges, and he worked really hard internally to make sure that there was a collegial bench,” Thomas said. “There was a bench that represented the people well, and they had a good working relationship, and I think that’s important on a bench of seven justices.”
That said, the most likely question voters might have about the candidates surrounds their judicial philosophies and how that would temper their view of cases before them.
Thomas said her philosophy was hard one to sum up in a few words but it was informed by her professorship.
“What I require of my law students is what I would require of me as a Supreme Court justice. You start with the text of the law or the text of the Constitution, that you know all of the preceding cases and the precedent that come before, and adhere to those,” she said.
“That you apply the law fairly and do 100 percent of your research. Making sure that we have thorough and careful decisions that act with integrity, and applying the law is what I demand of my students and what I would expect of myself on the Michigan Supreme Court.”
Bolden said she didn’t have a specific philosophy because that kind of thinking puts judges in boxes. Instead, she talked about her approach to finding the right answer.
“We have briefs, we have research, we have oral arguments. I talk to my law clerks, and I talked to the other justices. There are seven of us, and we see things in different ways, and it takes a majority to have a ruling. There’s a lot more collaboration at the Supreme Court level than people realize,” she said. “It’s important to take all the information that you have available to you, to talk to different people, to listen to oral arguments, to be very, very thoughtful and considerate when making these very important decisions for Michiganders. And that’s how I approach each and every case – with an openness that each case is not the same, also knowing that I have something to learn with every single case, that each case requires thoughtfulness and consideration for its uniqueness.”
O’Grady said his 15 years on the bench have helped him develop his own philosophy, which is less focused on the particular cases before him and based on decorum and an understanding that everyone before him is treated with respectfulness and kindness. He also said the role requires one not to be a judicial activist or push the law where they think it should go.
“You simply have to apply the law. The rule of law is what it is,” he said. “It’s created by the legislatures, presented to the court. Also understanding the textual interpretation of both the Constitution and statutory structure needs to be applied. The law needs to be applied to the facts through the lens of the law. And you must do so methodically at the same point in time.”
As to how politics and political pressure affect decisions, Bolden said it was less about pressure than it was about working together and having a robust discussion.
“We don’t always agree, but I think that’s part of getting the right answer, having robust discussion, having disagreement. And there have been times where a justice has changed my mind, and there has been a time where I’ve changed the justice’s mind,” Bolden said.
“The current court, I believe, is dedicated to the rule of law, even though we see things differently sometimes, and we are all focused on just getting the answer right.”
O’Grady said it is necessary to understand the political pressures but not let them enter the decision-making realm.
“As well as when you’re interacting with your other colleagues, it’s important to put politics at the door, whatever it is,” he said. “All people are political in nature or another, and just like when we talk to a jury, we ask them that we let them know that every human being has a bias. The question is whether you can put that bias aside and be able to answer these legal issues before you in a very impartial manner. … It’s not about being enemies, it’s about inspiring the thought of your colleagues, and being willing and open to listen to their point. Sometimes both of you come in with one view, and by the time you’re done with the conversation, you both come out with a totally different view, which is really kind of exciting. That is the development of the law.”
Thomas said that so many of the cases before the high court are not usually acrimonious nor reported in headlines, and those are the cases where the court is doing their best to resolve an important dispute or question of law.
“They aren’t seen as political questions, they are just practical questions that need to get answered to give guidance to the people of our state,” she said. “There’s so much work of the court that is not even touching a political lens. As a professor, my job is seeking things from all sides and making sure I understand all sides of an issue, and that I’m pushing others to see all sides of an issue. I think that’s a really important feature of a Supreme Court justice, to be able to make sure they are appreciated where everyone’s positions are at, and to make sure they take those in good faith and into consideration.”
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