The Michigan Supreme Court barred Kahlilia Davis from the bench until 2029. On November 3, nearly 84,000 Detroit voters elected her anyway, and many of them say nobody told them. The state’s newsrooms spent October explaining two Supreme Court candidates who could not serve. The one who actually won got her explainer after the polls closed.
Kahlilia Davis, a former Detroit 36th District Court judge, won one of three open seats on that court on November 3, 2026, with 83,991 votes, according to unofficial results. In June 2023 the Michigan Supreme Court gave her a six-year conditional suspension without pay for what it called a pattern of pervasive misconduct, including disconnecting her courtroom’s video recording equipment so hearings went unrecorded. The order bars her from exercising the powers of a judicial office until the suspension ends in June 2029, even if she is elected.
She was on the ballot because Court of Claims Judge James Robert Redford ruled in June 2026 that the suspension could not keep her off it, reversing the result of a 2024 Court of Claims ruling that did. Nothing on the ballot told voters any of this. The 36th District Court has asked the State Court Administrative Office what happens next.
Can Kahlilia Davis take the bench in January?
No. The Supreme Court’s 2023 order bars her from exercising judicial power until June 2029, whether or not she wins an election in the meantime.
Why was she suspended?
The Supreme Court found she abused her contempt powers, dismissed cases without required hearings, obstructed court administration, disconnected her courtroom recording equipment, misused a handicap parking space, and made misrepresentations to the Judicial Tenure Commission.
Did the ballot say she was suspended?
No. Michigan judicial ballots list names and offices. There is no mechanism to tell voters a candidate is under a disciplinary suspension.
Who decides what happens to the seat?
The 36th District Court has asked the State Court Administrative Office for guidance. SCAO declined to comment to WDIV. Results are unofficial until Wayne County certifies them.
The Race Nobody Was Watching
I spent October watching Michigan’s newsrooms get very worked up about two Supreme Court candidates. Jody White and Tom Howe, both friends of Clutch and both people I cheered for, ran statewide without the law licenses the Michigan Constitution requires to take a seat on the high court. WXYZ ran a two-part investigation. Michigan Public gave each of them a full interview on Morning Edition and then published a whole explainer on what would happen if either of them won. That explainer warned that some voters might pick them without realizing they could not serve.
Then the votes came in. White and Howe drew 5.3 and 4.7 percent statewide and lost. And in the largest city in Michigan, the exact scenario everyone had been war-gaming actually happened. A candidate who cannot serve won. She just wasn’t in the race anyone was covering.
So here’s what I notice immediately when I look at this: every institution in this story touched this case, and not one of them finished the job. The Judicial Tenure Commission took years. The Supreme Court wrote a sanction that planned for her winning an election and left the ballot question open. The Bureau of Elections flagged her and lost. Two judges read the same order and came out opposite ways. And at the end of that chain, the people who actually had to make the decision, Detroit voters standing in a booth, got a list of four names and nothing else.
| Candidate | Votes | Share |
|---|---|---|
| William Burton Jr. (won) | 86,544 | 29% |
| Kahlilia Yvette Davis (won; suspended until June 2029) | 83,991 | 28% |
| Delphia J. Burton (won) | 80,308 | 27% |
| Jo A. Irby | 49,216 | 16% |
Three seats, four names, vote for up to three. In a race shaped like that, every voter who did not know about the suspension had one realistic way to keep the court fully staffed: leave Davis off and vote for the other three. They could not make that choice because they did not know there was a choice to make. Detroit voter Jeffrey Williams put it plainly to WDIV on Friday: “They should have let us know that she was suspended and wouldn’t be able to serve as a judge.” Another voter, James Stephens, told the station that knowing would have changed his vote.
What the Supreme Court Found
Davis was elected to the 36th District Court in November 2016. Her first term got off to a rough start; Fox 2 Detroit reported in 2017 that she had not come to work for months after taking office, which she attributed to surgery and an infection, and that the chief judge then barred her from presiding over cases. Davis sued over that order.
The Judicial Tenure Commission filed formal charges, and on June 17, 2020, the Supreme Court suspended her with pay while the case proceeded. She did not return to the bench. That paid interim suspension lasted until her term expired at the start of 2023. She tried to run for reelection in 2022 and was kept off the ballot over unpaid campaign finance fines and filing requirements, and the Court of Appeals rejected her bid to force her name onto it.
In September 2022, the Commission recommended removal plus a six-year suspension. Because her term had already ended by the time the Supreme Court ruled, removal was moot. On June 23, 2023, the Court imposed a six-year conditional suspension without pay instead. The findings included abusing contempt powers, including against a court process server; dismissing cases without the hearings the law requires; obstructing court administration; making unauthorized recordings and publishing court proceedings; parking in a handicap space with a placard claiming she was there on official business for the Detroit Police Department and the mayor; and misrepresentations to the Commission. WDIV also reported that she threatened colleagues with Bible verses.
The finding that should stop every reader cold is the recording equipment. The Court found that Davis intentionally disconnected her courtroom’s video recording system and held hearings for weeks without an official record. Without a record, there is no transcript. Without a transcript, people who lost in her courtroom could not effectively appeal. The Court noted that some of the claims she dismissed may have had merit, and nobody can now check.
The sanction was written with exactly this election in mind. Quoting its own 1981 precedent in In re Probert, the Court said that if Davis were elected or appointed during the suspension, she would “nevertheless be debarred from exercising the power and prerogatives of the office until at least the expiration of the suspension.” The Court denied her motion for reconsideration in September 2023.
The Supreme Court suspended a judge for making sure there was no record of what happened in her courtroom. Three years later, the ballot carried no record of the suspension. Detroit voters ended up exactly where her litigants did: deciding without the information that mattered.
Elected to the 36th District Court
Davis wins one of two open seats on Detroit’s district court, a six-year term beginning in January 2017.
The no-show months
Fox 2 Detroit reports that Davis did not come to work for months after taking office; she says she was recovering from surgery and an infection. The chief judge bars her from presiding over cases, and she sues.
Interim suspension, with pay
With Judicial Tenure Commission charges pending, the Michigan Supreme Court suspends Davis with pay. She never returns to the bench.
Off the 2022 ballot; removal recommended
Davis is kept off the 2022 ballot over unpaid campaign finance fines and filing requirements. On August 22, the Court of Appeals rejects her bid to force her name onto it. On September 23, the Commission recommends that the Supreme Court remove her and suspend her without pay for six years.
The term ends
Davis’s term expires while the discipline case is still pending. Removal is no longer an available remedy.
Six-year conditional suspension
The Supreme Court imposes a six-year conditional suspension without pay and writes that if Davis is elected or appointed during it, she cannot exercise the office’s powers until it ends. Reconsideration is denied in September 2023.
Court of Claims keeps her off the ballot
Ruling on challenges filed against her candidacy, Court of Claims Judge Christopher P. Yates holds that the Supreme Court’s order makes her ineligible to be certified for a 36th District seat in 2024 and that the Secretary of State has a clear legal duty to exclude her name.
Bureau of Elections says no; Davis sues
Davis files nominating petitions on April 21. On April 30, Bureau of Elections Director Jonathan Brater says the department independently determined she was ineligible. On May 4, she sues in the Court of Claims, arguing the 2024 ruling confused eligibility for the ballot with the power to exercise judicial authority.
Judge Redford puts her back on
Court of Claims Judge James Robert Redford rules that Davis cannot be prevented from running during her suspension if she is otherwise qualified, and orders the state to review her 2026 filings without relying on the 2024 decision. No one disputes that she cannot serve before 2029.
Elected, and the questions start
Davis finishes second of four for three seats with 83,991 votes. On November 6, WDIV interviews voters who say they never knew. The court’s chief judge says the court will seek guidance from the State Court Administrative Office. SCAO declines to comment.
Two Judges, One Order, Opposite Answers
The legal fight was never over whether Davis could serve. Everyone agreed she could not before 2029. The fight was over whether she could run.
In 2024, Judge Yates read the Supreme Court’s order as a bar to certification. He held that the Constitution put a “clear legal duty” on the Secretary of State to keep her name off that year’s ballot, and noted the order would not stop her from running for a non-judicial office.
In 2026, Davis made the argument that the first ruling had blurred two things: being eligible to appear on a ballot, and being allowed to exercise judicial power. Judge Redford agreed with the result she wanted. In his June ruling, he wrote that she “cannot be prevented” from running during the suspension if she is otherwise qualified to appear on the ballot. The state was told to review her 2026 filings on their own terms, and she was certified.
Her attorney, Daniel Wholihan, framed it as a matter of democracy. “It’s for the voters to decide who should be their judge in Detroit,” he told The Detroit News in May. He also said that if she won, she would begin hearing cases once the suspension ended.
That argument only works if voters know what they are deciding. Redford’s ruling answered the eligibility question. It left the information question exactly where it started: nowhere. Michigan law has no ballot notation, no required notice, and no official voter guide entry that flags a candidate under a Supreme Court disciplinary order. The decision went to the voters. The facts did not go with it.
Michigan Public’s October explainer laid out what could happen if an ineligible Supreme Court candidate won: a legal challenge, likely in the Court of Appeals, and either the next eligible vote-getter takes the seat or, if the winner is already in office, the governor appoints a replacement. Nobody ran that analysis for Detroit’s district court before the election. Now the court is asking SCAO to run it after.
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$10/month ?The Coverage Gap
I want to be direct about this because it is the part of the story that will repeat if nobody names it.
WXYZ did a lot of pearl-clutching over the fact that Jody and Tom do not hold law licenses. Two stories in two days, State Bar records cited, the works. The message to voters was clear: a candidate without a bar card has no business on a judicial ballot.
Kahlilia Davis went to law school at Wayne State, passed the bar, practiced criminal defense, and has already been a judge. By the measure WXYZ applied to White and Howe, she checks every box. She is also a candidate whose own Supreme Court said, in writing, that she cannot exercise judicial power until 2029, after finding she unplugged the record in her own courtroom. A law license tells you someone passed the bar. It does not tell you what they did once they got to the bench. If the concern was really about voters picking someone who cannot serve, the clearest example on a Michigan ballot this year was sitting in Detroit, bar card and all, and I did not see it get anything like the on-air treatment White and Howe got before Election Day.
Look at what the statewide coverage was built around: two incumbents, a big media market, a clean hook, and two outsider candidates with almost no chance of winning. The explainer asked what happens if they win. The answer turned out to be: they don’t.
Davis’s fight did get covered, mostly in the spring and early summer. Deadline Detroit, The Detroit News, Metro Times, and MIRS reported the petition filing, the Bureau of Elections decision, the lawsuit, and the Redford ruling. Then the general election came, and the story that voters in the 36th District actually needed, the one that says this name is on your ballot and here is what the Supreme Court said about her, did not get the treatment the Supreme Court race got. Outlier Media flagged the suspension in its results roundup on November 4. WDIV’s headline on November 6 said voters were blindsided. Both ran after the polls closed.
District court is where most Michiganders actually meet the justice system. Traffic tickets, evictions, misdemeanors, small claims, arraignments, bond. The 36th District serves the entire city of Detroit. A seat on that bench affects more people’s daily lives than almost any other judicial office in the state, and it got a fraction of the attention of a statewide race that was never in doubt.
What Happens to the Seat
The new 36th District terms begin January 1, 2027. The Supreme Court’s suspension took effect June 23, 2023, and runs six years, to June 2029. That leaves roughly two and a half years of a six-year term in which the person Detroit elected cannot exercise the office.
The 36th District’s chief judge said the court will contact the State Court Administrative Office for guidance and follow up once it has direction. SCAO declined to comment to WDIV. The open questions are concrete. Whether Davis takes the oath in January. Whether the seat is treated as filled, leaving the court a judge short until mid-2029, or as vacant, which would put an appointment in the governor’s hands. Whether anyone files a quo warranto challenge, and if so, whether Jo Irby, the next candidate in line, has a claim. The Supreme Court’s order already answered the only question everyone agrees on: she cannot hear cases before 2029.
The results are unofficial until the Wayne County Board of Canvassers certifies them. Clutch Justice will follow what SCAO says and what the court does with it.
Why This Is Exactly Why We Cover Local Judicial Races
This is the whole argument for the work this site does, in one race.
On election night, I tracked four district court races and the Supreme Court race, and I marked Clutch Picks in each of them. I did that because the races at the bottom of the ballot are the ones where voters have the least information and the most at stake. The election night results page ended with a call for people to start planning for the next round of trial court races now. Detroit just showed why.
Back in January, when I wrote about what I would push for as a constitutional convention delegate, mandatory digital recording of every court proceeding was near the top of the list. Davis is the reason that belongs in law and not in a courtroom’s discretion. A judge was able to switch off the record. It took the state years to stop her, and then she ended up back on a ballot with no record of that either.
A few fixes would close the gap without taking anything away from voters. A notation on the ballot or in the Secretary of State’s official candidate listing when a judicial candidate is under a Supreme Court suspension. A requirement that the 36th District, or any court, publish what happens to a seat in this situation before the election instead of after it. An appellate ruling on ballot eligibility before ballots are printed. None of that tells anyone how to vote. All of it tells them what they are voting on.
And for the rest of us: look up your judges. Search the Judicial Misconduct Database. Read the names on the bottom of your ballot before you get to the booth. Every check in this system had a hand on this case, and every one of them stopped short. The last check was supposed to be the voters, and nobody gave them the file. Next time, go get it yourself. Clutch Justice will be here to help you find it.
