The Rhode Island Ethics Commission voted 6-1 Tuesday to investigate whether former House Speaker Joe Shekarchi’s quest to join the state Supreme Court violates the revolving door law.
Jason Gramitt, executive director of the commission, called the vote “a very preliminary determination where the commission just looks at the complaint, assumes for the sake of that hearing that everything in it is true, and answers the question to, well, ‘Could that violate the (state) code of ethics?’”
The complaint was filed by Michael Yelnosky, a professor and former dean at Roger Williams University School of Law.
The revolving door law was put into place after consecutive Rhode Island Supreme Court chief justices resigned amid scandal in the 1980s and ’90s. It calls in most cases for state lawmakers to be out of state government for one year before taking another state government post.
But in 2020, the Ethics Commission didn’t stand in the way when Senate Judiciary Chairwoman Erin Lynch Prata vaulted from the legislature onto the Supreme Court. She argued that the Supreme Court, as a constitutional office, was exempt from the revolving door law. After researching the case, commission staff said Lynch Prata was wrong. But the commission itself rejected that assertion, and then-Gov. Gina Raimondo appointed Lynch Prata.
Shekarchi, who cited Lynch Prata’s argument when he stepped down as House speaker last month, said via email he will not have further comment until the Ethics Commission completes its process.
The Warwick Democrat is seeking the vacancy created by the retirement this year of former Justice Maureen McKenna Goldberg. Shekarchi is being represented in the Ethics Commission case by lawyer Thomas Dickinson.
In an interview, the Ethics Commission’s Gramitt said the complaint against Shekarchi is different from many cases reviewed by the commission.
“In a normal case, there are a lot of facts that are in dispute,” he said. “We would send our investigators out to collect documents and evidence and talk to people and potentially take testimony. In this case, there doesn’t really seem to be any factual issues that are in dispute. It will really probably just come down to some questions of interpretation of the relevant statutes and regulations, and the application of the revolving door laws.”
There is not yet a date scheduled for the Ethics Commission to pursue the matter, but Gramitt said he expects that to happen “fairly quickly.”
The Judicial Nominating Commission has until Aug. 4 to provide Gov. Dan McKee with three to five names to fill the Supreme Court vacancy. The governor then has 21 days to make his nomination, subject to General Assembly confirmation.
