The Tennessee Supreme Court announced public hearings for the six applicants for attorney general in a statement issued on Monday.
“The Tennessee Supreme Court will begin a public hearing on August 8, 2022, that will include formal interviews of the six applicants for Attorney General and Reporter. Under the state constitution, the Tennessee Attorney General and Reporter is appointed by the state Supreme Court and serves an eight-year term,” the state Supreme Court said.
“The August 8 hearing will be held in the Nashville Supreme Court Building starting at 9:30 a.m. CDT. The hearings will be livestreamed to the Court’s YouTube channel – https://www.youtube.com/user/TNCourts/featured,” the state Supreme Court added.
The applicants will be allowed to give 10-minute introductory statements and are able to cede some of that time to a surrogate.
“After a general overview of the process, each applicant will introduce himself to the Court for a period of no longer than 10 minutes. Applicants may have others speak on their behalf, but the total introductory time cannot exceed 10 minutes,” the statement said.
The public will be given an opportunity to speak in opposition to any of the six applicants. The state Supreme Court did not mention if public comments could be made in support of an applicant or if people could ask questions.
“After introductions, members of the public present at the Nashville Supreme Court Building may speak in opposition to any applicant. Anyone who wants to speak in opposition to an applicant is limited to three minutes. Applicants will then have three minutes to respond,” said the state Supreme Court’s statement.
“The Court will then conduct formal interviews of each of the applicants. These interviews are not time limited. When all applicants have completed their formal interviews, the Supreme Court will deliberate on next steps, including reducing the pool of applicants and conducting informal discussions with one or more applicants. The process is expected to conclude on Tuesday, August 9, pending completion of the required background checks,” the statement added.
The applicants for Tennessee attorney general are Donald Q. Cochran Jr, Jerome Cochran, David Michael Dunavant, R. Culver Schmid, Jonathan Thomas Skrmetti, and William Edwin “Bill” Young
Current Attorney General Herb Slatery III is not seeking an additional eight-year term and will leave office on August 31.
The term for the new attorney general will begin September 1, 2022.
The Tennessee Star previously reported that this is the first time in known history at the Tennessee Supreme Court has listed the names of all the applicants in the process to select the next attorney general.
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Aaron Gulbransen is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network. Email tips to [email protected]. Follow Aaron on GETTR, Twitter, Truth Social, and Parler.
Photo “Jerome Cochran” by Jerome Cochran. Background Photo “Tennessee Supreme Court” by Jon698. CC BY-SA 4.0.
