Cascos v. Tarrant Cnty. Democratic Party
Case No. 14-0470
Case Summary written by Keirsten Hamilton, Staff Member.
PER CURIUM.
Upon Wendy Davis’s certification as the Democratic nominee for State Senate in the 2008 primary election, Republican primary candidate Kim Brimer filed suit seeking to remove Davis from the general election. Brimer’s suit failed and Davis won the general election. After successfully defending the suit, the state and county Democratic Party chairpersons sought reimbursement for legal expenses from the Secretary of State, per the Texas Election Code. The Election Code provides that parties incurring legal expenses “may apply to the secretary of state for state funds to reimburse expenses connected with administering primary elections.” Although the Secretary of State has discretion in determining whether to reimburse the party, if parties disagree, the Code provides that they may sue the Secretary of State in Travis County district court.
Davis’s candidacy was challenged both before and after the primary election. The Secretary of State approved a reimbursement request for legal expenses for the party’s previous, pre-primary challenge; however, the Secretary denied the subsequent request for reimbursement of attorney’s fees related to defending the post-primary suit filed by Brimer. Noting that the expenses associated with defending against Brimer’s suit were, “unrelated to the administration of the primary election,” the Secretary of State denied reimbursement from primary-election funds because these expenses occurred after the primary election had already been held and were not related to the primary election; thus, these expenses did not fit within the purposes of the funds appropriated by the Legislature. Following the Secretary’s denial, the Democratic Party sued the Secretary in Travis County.
Reasoning that the Election Code was ambiguous on the issue of whether the Secretary of State was required to reimburse expenses incurred by the Democratic Party “in successfully litigating the eligibility of a Democratic candidate brought by her Republican opponent,” the district court deferred to the judgment of the Secretary. The Court of Appeals disagreed with the trial court, reasoning that the Election Code is clear: the Secretary of State was required to reimburse the party’s legal expenses in this case. The court of appeals’ reasoning did not persuade the Supreme Court. Instead, the Court determined that the Secretary of State does not have an obligation to reimburse legal expenses incurred during the course of defending a candidate’s right to appear on the general election ballot; thus, the Supreme Court held that the Secretary of State had not abused his discretion.
Issue: Did the Secretary of State abuse his discretion in denying the requested reimbursement for the Democratic Party’s legal expenses from the primary election fund?
The court of appeals based its decision on language from section 173.001(a). While subsection (a) states that the use of state funds for expenses incurred “in connection with a primary election,” the Court emphasized that subsection (b) does not allow funds to be used when a party’s expenses are “incurred in connection with . . . activity that is not necessary for the holding of a primary election.” On this basis, the Court rejected the court of appeals’ broad construction of “in connection with a primary election”—which allowed the court to reverse the trial court—for two reasons. The Court reasoned that the court of appeals’ construction took the language out of context and removed the secretary’s discretion from the statute.
To make its determination, the Court examined the relevant portion of the Election Code, Chapter 173. Chapter 173 allows the secretary to use appropriations “to pay salaries and other necessary expenses in connection with the administration of primary elections,” requires the secretary to review these requests for funding from appropriations, and gives the secretary discretion “to determine which requested expenses are ‘reasonably necessary for the proper holding of the primary election,’” Although the secretary has discretion to determine if an expense is reasonably necessary, if he determines that it is necessary, he must approve the reasonably necessary portion of the expense—whether his determination that the expense is reasonably necessary is correct or not. Due to the discretionary nature of the secretary’s determination, the Court applied an abuse of discretion standard. Thus, the Court concluded that “[u]nless his decision not to approve the expenses was an abuse of discretion, he had no duty (or authority) to pay them.”
The Court reasoned that the Secretary of State did not abuse his discretion in denying expenses incurred defending Davis’s right to appear on the general-election ballot four months after the primary election because the statute “limits reimbursement to those expenses reasonably necessary to the holding or administration of the primary election.” Regarding the party’s argument that the Secretary of State was bound to pay the expenses because it had previously paid similar expenses, the Court reasoned that Chapter 173 merely obligates the Secretary of State to approve only those expenses he finds to be “reasonably necessary for the proper holding of the primary election,”; here, the Secretary used his discretion to determine that these expenses were unrelated to the primary election. The Court determined that the Secretary’s discretion is not “forever bound by the handling of a single application for payment.”
Finding no improper motive for rejecting the payment, and in the absence of a statutory provision or applicable administrative rule obligating him to reimburse the party for its expenses in defending Davis, the Court concluded that the Secretary did not abuse its discretion in denying the party’s request. On this basis, the Supreme Court granted the Secretary of State’s petition for review, and without hearing oral argument, reversed the court of appeals’ judgment and rendered judgment that the political parties take nothing.