Castro up for retention this November

CNMI Supreme Court Chief Justice Alexandro Cruz Castro is up for retention election at the Nov. 6, 2018, general election.

Castro was nominated to serve as chief justice in September 2012. His eight-year term expires in 2020.

Under the CNMI Constitution, the question whether justices or judges will be retained shall be put to a vote at a general election immediately before the end of that justice’s or judge’s term of office.

Castro, 65, has yet to announce if he is interested in submitting to the retention election.

He ascended to the CNMI Supreme Court bench in July 1998. In 2005, voters retained him to the high tribunal’s bench.

As the first indigenous attorney general, Castro was instrumental in setting up the annual AG’s Cup speech competition.

Castro became an associate judge in Superior Court in 1989 and became presiding judge in 1993.