The Supreme Court turned away a former Pennsylvania judge’s bid to reverse his suspension for dozens of partisan Facebook posts praising Democrats, and the career and pension losses that followed.
On Monday the nation’s highest court declined to hear Mark Cohen’s challenge to the discipline that ended his time on the bench, The Hill reported.
Pennsylvania’s Judicial Conduct Board suspended Cohen in 2024 after finding a pattern of online political advocacy. Lower courts upheld that punishment. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court applied the same kind of balancing test used when a government employee claims an employer crossed the line on free speech. The U.S. Supreme Court then closed the door on further review.
Cohen also lost his pensions, court filings show. The case now ends with the state’s judgment intact: a judge does not get a free pass to run partisan cheerleading from a personal account while holding judicial office.
The board’s case centered on dozens of Facebook posts. Cohen praised Democrats, including former President Biden and Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro. He also pushed policy causes such as raising the minimum wage.
In court filings, the Judicial Conduct Board labeled the material “partisan cheerleading.” The board argued there is no precedent that lets sitting judges treat that kind of advocacy as protected First Amendment activity in the same way ordinary citizens might claim.
Cohen had run for the judgeship as a Democrat. Before that, he spent more than four decades in the Pennsylvania Legislature. The posts did not read like neutral civic commentary. They read like continued party-line campaigning after he put on the robe.
Cohen cast the posts as speech on matters of public concern. His legal team said lower courts applied a First Amendment standard that was too weak to protect judicial expression and asked the Supreme Court to step in.
His attorneys wrote in the petition:
“This Court’s guidance is sorely needed.”
They warned of broader damage if the state ruling stayed in place:
“If allowed to stand, the Cohen decision will have a chilling effect on judicial speech, invite political interference in the judicial branch, undermine the rule of law, and have the perverse effect of impugning the integrity of the judiciary.”
Lawyers at DLA Piper, representing Cohen, framed the petition as a clean vehicle for a major constitutional question:
“This Court should grant the petition because it cleanly presents a question of importance concerning fundamental First Amendment protections for members of the judiciary.”
Pennsylvania’s Judicial Conduct Board, represented by Stanford Law School’s Supreme Court Litigation Clinic, told the justices the opposite story. In the board’s view, the case was ordinary discipline under long-settled limits on judges, not a novel free-speech crisis.
Board filings put it this way:
“There is no reason for this Court to review that straightforward application of familiar rules that judges around the country have followed for decades.”
That argument tracked a basic expectation shared by many voters outside the bar: the courtroom is not a campaign office. Judges hold power over liberty, property, and public trust. When they flood social media with party praise and policy agitation, they invite the charge that the bench has a team jersey on.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s balancing approach treated Cohen like other government workers who claim speech rights against an employer’s discipline. It did not invent a special political license for judges who want to keep stumping online.
By turning the case away, the U.S. Supreme Court left the suspension and the pension loss undisturbed. It issued no new national rule and gave Cohen no relief.
The practical result is local and concrete. A former legislator-turned-judge who kept boosting Democrats and progressive policy goals on Facebook stays disciplined under Pennsylvania’s system. His First Amendment theory did not move the justices to reopen the fight.
Open questions remain in the public record around the exact texts and dates of every post, the full list of ethics provisions applied, and the precise mechanics of the pension penalty. None of those gaps change the core sequence: partisan posts, state discipline in 2024, courts upholding it, and a final refusal of review in Washington.
Judges who want the public’s confidence should sound like referees, not like precinct captains with a gavel. Pennsylvania enforced that line, and the Supreme Court let the ruling stand.
