State Court Justice Project
The State Court Justice Project is a project of the left-of-center judicial policy advocacy group Alliance for Justice. 1 Alliance for Justice is a legal policy coalition best known for its Judicial Selection Project, which supports the nomination of left-of-center judges to the federal judicial system. 2 The State Court Justice Project is the state court analog to the Judicial Selection Project. The project seeks to elect judges that will weaken voter integrity laws and overrule congressional redistricting maps created by state legislatures. 3 Adelsberg, Jackie. “The Role of State Courts in Protecting Our Democracy” Alliance for Justice. June 23, 2022. Accessed November 5, 2022.
Contents
https://www.afj.org/article/the-role-of-state-courts-in-protecting-our-democracy/[/note]
Finances
Alliance for Justice, the parent organization to the State Court Justice Project, receives funding from numerous notable left-of-center contributors, including Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, the Open Society Foundations, the Ford Foundation, and the California Endowment. 4
In 2019, the Alliance for Justice received $7,771,021 in contributions, 5 $8,404,547 in total revenue, 6 made $5,560,037 in expenditures, 7 and possessed $11,881,214 in net assets. 8
Operations
The State Court Justice Project documents how judges are elected to state supreme courts, tracks when each state supreme court judge’s term expires, and tracks the party alignment of all state court judges. 1 The State Court Justice uses this data to highlight upcoming state supreme court elections and urges individuals to elect and nominate judges whose views align with the left-of-center positions of Alliance for Justice. 1
In 2022, Alliance for Justice ran a campaign to develop support for the State Court Justice Project, claiming that the federal judiciary has “been captured by the far-right” and that as a result “the fight” for left-of-center issues must shift to the state courts. 9 The campaign also highlighted the fact that 60% of state supreme court justices were aligned with the Republican Party as an impetus for creating the State Court Justice Project. 9
In an article published by Alliance for Justice, the organization stated that the State Court Justice Project was created in 2022 in response to the result of the 2020 presidential election, 10 and that the State Court Justice Project must be used as a tool to elect state supreme court judges that will weaken voter integrity laws and overrule congressional districting maps opposed by the Alliance for Justice. 10
Leadership
Rakim Brooks is the president of the Alliance for Justice and State Court Justice Project. 11 Prior to joining the Alliance for Justice, Brooks was a campaign manager for the ACLU’s Systematic Equality Campaign, 11 a project of the ACLU that seeks to advance policies that benefit some groups over others based on race and gender classifications. 12
Financial Statistics
Total Assets
Total Revenue
Total Expenses
| Year | Total Assets | Total Revenue | Total Expenses | Filing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | $17,145,795 | $4,952,351 | $9,266,100 | View |
| 2023 | $21,754,702 | $7,371,280 | $8,836,673 | View |
| 2022 | $23,359,215 | $12,258,749 | $7,779,537 | View |
| 2021 | $16,204,744 | $6,987,184 | $5,740,979 | View |
| 2020 | $13,824,890 | $5,142,561 | $5,477,838 | View |
Prior year filings: 2019, 2018, 2017, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011
Revenue Detail
Expenses Detail
Employee Compensation
- Number of Employees: 57
Highest Earning Employees
Grant Activity
All-time grants received statistics from Candid dataset:
- Total Grant Value: $76,892,359
- Number of Grants: 1,286
- Number of Funders: 276
Selection of highest value grants received from the last seven years:
All-time grants given statistics from Candid dataset:
- Total Grant Value: $2,766,650
- Number of Grants: 10
- Number of Recipients: 3
Selection of highest value grants given from the last seven years:
References
https://www.afj.org/article/the-role-of-state-courts-in-protecting-our-democracy/