Jim Fouts ineligible to seek 5th term as Warren mayor, Michigan Court of Appeals rules

The Michigan Court of Appeals ruled Friday that Warren Mayor Jim Fouts is not eligible to run this year for another term.

The ruling comes less than a month after a Macomb County Circuit Court judge denied a motion from the Warren City Council and Councilman Ron Papandrea that challenged Fouts' eligibility. They argued that Fouts is ineligible to run because of term limits approved by voters in 2020.

The Circuit Court ruled in favor of City Clerk Sonja Buffa and the Warren Election Commission, which said Fouts was eligible for reelection this year. The longtime politician is seeking a fifth, four-year term as mayor of Michigan's third-populous city.

But the Court of Appeals reversed the Circuit Court's decision and ruled in favor of the City Council.

"Buffa is hereby ordered to immediately disqualify Mayor Fouts as a candidate for mayor in 2023 and not place his name on the ballot for election," the Court of Appeals' opinion said.

Addressing confusion over Warren's 2020 term-limit proposal

Macomb County Circuit Judge Joseph Toia wrote that "the evidence presented demonstrates that the ballot language and Charter are not clear on whether previous terms served are counted towards the current term limits." He wrote " 'any terms of years served prior to this amendment are included' language was in the ballot's explanatory caption, but not in the 'proposal' section on the ballot or in the amended charter."

The Court of Appeals disagreed.

"We conclude that the relevant charter sections’ failure to specify that time in office before the 2020 amendment will be counted does not make them ambiguous. Nor do we find dispositive the fact that the 'terms served prior' language was not in the ballot proposal question itself, where the language actually was on the ballot within the proposal section," according to the ruling.

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Fouts: City residents should decide who will be mayor

Fouts said Warren residents should be able to decide who will be mayor.

“The Michigan Court of Appeals decision is at best an unlikely and implausible conclusion clearly contradicting the ruling of the Macomb County Circuit Court Judge Toia,” Fouts said in a lengthy response.

He said the Court of Appeals “chose to ignore past Supreme Court opinions and allow an unclear and clearly unconstitutional opinion to be given.”

“This was a targeted proposal in which I was the only one affected by the vote without acknowledging it was aimed at only Mayor Fouts.

“Thus, my conclusion is that the Court of Appeals has chosen to deny the voters of Warren the right to have a choice in November. The council has achieved a TKO in denying a competitive election in November."

He expressed doubt "that I can get a fair and objective legal opinion in this court and maybe beyond?"

Fouts has not been named a party in any of the lawsuits, but the decisions by the courts directly affect him.

Application to appeal to Michigan Supreme Court expected

Lawrence Garcia, an attorney representing the city clerk and Warren Election Commission, had no comment on the ruling. He said his clients want to appeal. They can make an application to appeal to the Michigan Supreme Court, which could happen as early as next week.

It would not be the first time the Michigan Supreme Court took up a case pertaining to term limits in Warren.

It did so in 2019, making a ruling in June of that year that four veteran councilmen's names were to be off the primary ballot, reversing a Court of Appeals ruling that would have allowed the four names to be on the ballot. That term-limit situation was a seesaw battle through the courts with expedited appeals.

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Term-limit questions have appeared in ballot questions before Warren voters in 1998, 2016 and 2020.

Candidates have until Tuesday to file for office and until April 28 to withdraw. Fouts, Papandrea, City Council President Pat Green, state Rep. Lori Stone and Macomb County Commissioner Michelle Nard have filed to run for mayor. The term runs from November 2023 until November 2027.

A more consequential date, if the Michigan Supreme Court takes up the appeal, would come within the next few months. Ballots will have to be finalized so they can be printed and sent to clerks by June 24, when clerks have to transmit or mail absent voter ballots to military or overseas voters who applied for one.

Council attorney: Decision 'upheld the will of the voters'

Jeff Schroder, an attorney representing the City Council, said "we're very pleased with the court's decision because it upheld the will of the voters who approved a term limit amendment by over 67% of the vote in 2020."

He said the administration "has been playing games with term limits for over a decade. This decision, once again, corrects their unlawful actions." Schroder said he believes the "real problem" is the city attorney, who he said "keeps writing bogus legal opinions and putting his thumb on the scale so the mayor gets the result he wants. In this case, it's an extra term."

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Voters in 2020 approved a city charter amendment that a mayor may serve only three four-year terms, or 12 years, like other elected officials in the city. The 2020 vote didn’t affect Fouts’ fourth, four-year term, which began in 2019, but it did appear that he would be unable to seek a fifth term.

But City Attorney Ethan Vinson issued an opinion that the 2020 term limits did not bar Fouts from running for a fifth term.

Vinson’s opinion, which was accepted by the Warren Election Commission during an Election Day meeting in November, stated it was not clear that the ballot proposal approved by voters in 2020 should apply to Fouts.

Contact Christina Hall: chall@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter: @challreporter.

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Court of Appeals: Jim Fouts ineligible for 5th term as Warren mayor