The State Bar of Texas’ disciplinary committee has egg on its face after suffering an embarrassing appeals court loss in its case against former Donald Trump lawyer Sidney Powell.
The 5th District Court of Appeals recently sided with a lower court that tossed out the bar’s ethics case against Powell largely on procedural and clerical errors. The court’s 24-page opinion scolded attorneys for the Commission for Lawyer Discipline for their “scattershot” handling of the case.
We’re troubled by the commission’s sloppiness in this high-profile, important case, which warranted much more careful handling. But we urge it to regroup and continue seeking disciplinary action against Powell in connection with her far more egregious actions in trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
Let’s take a step back and recall some important facts.
Shortly after the election, Powell brought lawsuits against Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona and Georgia alleging that a vast conspiracy between Dominion Voting Systems and foreign dictators resulted in hundreds of thousands of fraudulent votes cast in favor of President Joe Biden. None of the cases was successful.
Last year, Fox News agreed to a $787.5 million settlement in a defamation case brought by Dominion after the network repeatedly aired and promoted Powell and her claims. And in October, the Dallas attorney pleaded guilty in Georgia to six reduced criminal charges accusing her of conspiring to intentionally interfere with the performance of election duties.
Back home, the state bar for two years has been trying to win sanctions against Powell for alleged ethical misconduct by filing frivolous suits in the battleground states. But unfortunately the bar’s case was derailed before it ever made it to trial when Collin County state District Judge Andrea Bouressa granted Powell’s motion for summary judgment in February 2023.
That ruling was made in large part because the bar’s response to Powell’s motion was riddled with errors, including critical misnumbering and exclusion of exhibits. We strongly criticized Bouressa’s ruling, and said she should have shown some latitude given the seriousness of the case.
There’s no excuse for the bar’s mistakes. All it had to do was present “more than a scintilla” of evidence that the case should move forward. It failed to do so, the 5th District court held, and it now appears the case has little hope. What a dumbfounding result given all we’ve learned about Powell in the last couple of years.
A spokeswoman for the bar told us in an email she couldn’t comment on what the commission will do next. Perhaps it will try to appeal the ruling or bring a new case against Powell based on her Georgia pleas, as some prominent lawyers have urged.
Whatever course it takes, we urge the bar to move forward and, this time, far more competently.
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