NC DISTRICT COURT JUDGE, DISTRICT 35, SEAT 1

NOTE: You may vote for one. Candidates are presented below in the order they appear on your ballot. All of my research sources and links for these candidates are presented after and below both candidate profiles.

Reason for my Endorsement:

District Court is where many North Carolinians who enter a courtroom are most likely to encounter a judge. District Court judges hear misdemeanor criminal cases, traffic matters, domestic violence cases, divorce and child-custody disputes, juvenile cases and many civil matters. In many of those cases, the judge rather than a jury makes the decision. District 35 includes Watauga, Avery, Mitchell, Yancey and Madison counties.

This endorsement was a close call for me. Both candidates are Boone attorneys, and neither has previously served as a judge.

Eller brings approximately three decades of legal practice concentrated in criminal, traffic and juvenile defense, together with years of public decision-making on the Watauga County Board of Elections. Brooks brings thirteen years of practice that he says has occurred almost entirely in District Court, including criminal and family law matters, together with experience serving on Boone’s quasi-judicial Board of Adjustment.

Neither man’s previous experience tells us exactly what kind of judge he would become of course. But their records tell us considerably more than campaign promises that both will be fair and impartial. So I focused on what kinds of legal work they have done, what kinds of decisions they have previously made, and, in looking at those decisions, something about how they approached making them.

ERIC F. ELLER (Republican)

Eric Eller campaign Facebook

Eller has practiced law in North Carolina since 1995, principally in criminal, traffic and juvenile defense. He earned his undergraduate degree from Appalachian State University and his J.D. from Wake Forest University School of Law. He is also an Army veteran who served as an M-1 Abrams tank mechanic in West Germany. Eller describes his approach to judging as treating people with dignity and applying the law with “fairness and consistency.”

Eller also has a public decision-making record outside the courtroom. He served on the Watauga County Board of Elections from 2017 through 2025 and was appointed its chairman in 2025. His tenure included elections conducted during COVID and following Hurricane Helene. I want to also recognize and thank Eller, as Chair of the local Board of Elections, for not eliminating ASU’s campus early voting site as so many other NC Boards elected to do this year.

One particularly consequential Eller decision came in 2024 after legislative redistricting created five different ballot styles within Watauga County. The Watauga County Voting Rights Task Force asked the Board of Elections to make all ballot styles available at each of the county’s 20 Election Day precincts. That would have allowed registered voters who appeared at the wrong precinct and needed to vote provisionally to receive the correct ballot style, including the appropriate county-commissioner contest. I was at that meeting and spoke in favor of the proposal on behalf of the Task Force.

Board members debated whether they could legally do so and expressed concern that the Board might be sued if it provided the additional ballot styles. The Board ultimately rejected the proposal 4-1. Eller voted against it. While this decision doesn’t tell us how Eller would decide a criminal, domestic or juvenile case, it does provide an example of how he exercised governmental decision-making authority when faced with a contested question involving competing legal concerns and consequences for voters.

His elections-board record also contains more routine examples as well. In 2018, Eller authored a resolution unanimously adopted by the Board asking county commissioners to fund two additional full-time elections employees and provide adequate office and equipment-storage space.

ANDREW BROOKS (Democrat)

Andrew Brooks campaign website

Brooks has practiced law in Western North Carolina for thirteen years. He earned his undergraduate degree from Wittenberg University and his J.D. from Charleston School of Law. His campaign says his practice has been “almost exclusively” in District Court, where he has handled the kinds of matters that make up much of a District Court docket.

Brooks says people appearing in court should be heard, respected and treated impartially, and describes his District Court experience as making him “Ready on Day One.”

Brooks also served as Chairman on the Boone Board of Adjustment, a quasi-judicial body that hears sworn testimony and evidence and applies the Town’s land-use ordinance to individual cases.

A 2019 hotel-variance case provides an example of Brooks in that role. Before the hearing began, Brooks disclosed that a neighboring property owner had approached him about the proposed hotel. He said he refused to discuss the project because he was a Board member, had expressed no opinion about the case, and believed he remained neutral. The applicant’s attorney did not object to his participation.

Brooks then participated in hearing the case, including questioning the applicant and witnesses. During deliberations, he questioned whether the claimed hardship resulted from conditions peculiar to the property or largely from choices made by the developer, including the economics and design of the proposed hotel. He concluded that the required hardship had not been established and voted with the Board against the findings necessary to grant the variance.

A zoning variance is of course very different from deciding someone’s criminal charge or child-custody case. But the proceeding gives us something more useful than a campaign promise: an example of Brooks hearing evidence, questioning witnesses, applying a legal standard and explaining the basis for his decision.