Difference between revisions of "Political Adversaries Cut From the Same Cloth"

While Justice Leah Ward Sears won her 2004 re-election against Brantley, she resigned from the Georgia Supreme Court bench in 2009. Since then she has worked various jobs, for various organizations and in different capacities. In 2021, Sears served as chair of Warnock and Ossoff’s Federal Nominations Advisory Commission alongside Allegra Lawrence Hardy, who previously served as the chair of Stacey Abrams’ gubernatorial campaign. In December of 2021, Sears was appointed by the Judicial Qualifications Commission (JQC) as outside-independent counsel for Chuck Boring, the JQC director at the time, to assist in presiding over a JQC complaint against Cobb County Superior Court Judge, Rob Leonard II (a complaint from which Boring recused himself). When Sears learned that Matt McMaster was challenging Leonard in the May 2022 election, Sears rapidly dismissed the JQC complaint against Leonard and Charles Ford entered the race for Judge Leonard’s seat just weeks later.

Regardless of whether Sears had an influence over Charles Ford's decision to challenge Judge Rob Leonard II in the 2022 Cobb County Superior Court election, why the JQC would appoint a prominent political figure such as Sears to that role puts the judgment and competency of the JQC severely in question.

Judge Rob Leonard won his 2022 re-election against the two challengers, Ford and McMaster, with a healthy margin.<ref>Had Sears and the JQC eventually removed Rob Leonard from the bench after the election, Governor Brian Kemp would have had the opportunity to appoint a new Superior Judge in Cobb County.</ref>