District 168 is a district court in El Paso County, Texas.[1]
El Paso County also contains one county court and the following district courts: District 34, District 41, District 65, District 120, District 171, District 205, District 210, District 243, District 327, District 346, District 383, District 384, District 388, District 409 and District 448.
Texas is one of 43 states that hold elections for judicial positions. To learn more about judicial selection in Texas, click here.
The judges of the Texas District Courts are chosen in partisan elections. They serve four-year terms, after which they must run for re-election if they wish to continue serving.[4]
Though Texas is home to more than 400 district courts, the courts are grouped into nine administrative judicial regions. Each region is overseen by a presiding judge who is appointed by the governor to a four-year term. According to the state courts website, the presiding judge may be a "regular elected or retired district judge, a former judge with at least 12 years of service as a district judge, or a retired appellate judge with judicial experience on a district court."[5]
Qualifications
To serve on the district courts, a judge must be:
*While no judge older than 74 may run for office, sitting judges who turn 75 are permitted to continue serving until their term expires.[4]
Partisan primaries are held if even one candidate has filed for a position. To advance to the general election, a candidate must win a majority (over 50 percent) of the vote. If no candidate in a race wins the majority—as in cases where more than two candidates are competing for a seat—a runoff election is held between the top two candidates.[7][8]
Though Texas officially has closed primaries (requiring that voters declare party affiliation in advance in order to participate), the state's primaries are functionally open: registered voters may vote in any single party's primary if they have not voted in the primary of another party. The elections are closed, however, in that voters may not participate in the proceedings (a runoff primary or a convention) of another party thereafter.[7]
The winning candidates from each major party's primary, as well as any additional minor party candidates, compete in a general election on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November. If a candidate was unopposed in the general election, his or her name will still appear on the general election ballot.[7][9]