Tennessee Candidate Says the State Won't Give Him a Hearing on His Law License

Elliott Schuchardt, a candidate for the Tennessee General Assembly, says that the State of Tennessee won’t give a him a hearing on his law license.

Schuchardt is a candidate for State Representative in the August 2026 primary. He is running in District 18, which covers most of the suburbs surrounding Knoxville.

Schuchardt is running against incumbent Elaine Davis. Davis is the Vice Chair of the Judiciary Committee of the General Assembly. As such, she is responsible for reviewing laws concerning judicial ethics in the State.

Schuchardt says that Davis is not doing her job in the General Assembly. He says that the State board that regulates lawyers is attacking attorneys for political purposes. The Board has filed ethics cases against more than 50 attorneys who ran for office in recent years.

Schuchardt says that that Tennessee ethics board has attacked his license to practice law, for the past eight years. They did so, after Schuchardt defended a case against a group of court insiders in Knox County. Schuchardt says that that he has not been able to obtain a hearing on virtually all of the case in the past eight years.

Schuchardt says that the courts in Tennessee have written three opinions on his case. Those opinions rely on evidence that does not exist. Schuchardt says that he has not been able to challenge the State's case because Tennessee won't give him a hearing on the case.

The Tennessee Supreme Court recently held that it was proper to deny Schuchardt access to witnesses, and a hearing.

Since no hearing was held, no evidence was ever presented against Schuchardt on virtually all issues. No one ever testified, and Schuchardt was not permitted to call witnesses, testify, present documents, or cross-examine witnesses.

According to Schuchardt, the Supreme Court’s opinion is based on a wide variety of “evidence” that simply does not exist. For example, the opinion says that Schuchardt “abandoned” a case he filed on behalf of Jamie McBryar. However, McBryar never testified in the case. Schuchardt says that he fully represented McBryar, and was not permitted to testify on the issue.

The opinion says that Schuchardt created a “conflict of interest” involving his client Aaron King. However, no hearing was ever held on this issue. Aaron King never testified. King has twice written to Schuchardt, saying that he does not approve of Tennessee’s attacks on Schuchardt’s license to practice law.

The opinion says that Schuchardt “misled” the ethics board regarding the witnesses at a conservatorship hearing for Dustin Welsh, in Anderson County. Schuchardt says that his testimony was accurate. The Supreme Court refused to give him a hearing on the issue. The Court decided to sanction Schuchardt, even though no evidence was ever presented on the issue. The State did not allow Schuchardt to testify or call witnesses.

Schuchardt says that the State ethics board is attempting to destroy his law license because he filed a lawsuit against a court employee for fabricating evidence. That complaint, against Sandra Garrett, is currently pending in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee.

Schuchardt says that Garrett has a history of attacking the law licenses of lawyers who are running for office. Garrett has filed ethics cases against more than fifty lawyers who ran for office in Tennessee. Many of these lawyers were running against sitting judges. Schuchardt says that Garrett also has a history of attacking the law licenses of African American lawyers and judges.

Schuchardt says there is an appearance of self-dealing by court officials in his case. He says that Garrett is working with a group of government employees, who attacked his license as part of a court case. These government officials used the attacks on Schuchardt's license to obtain a $200,000 payment for themselves, by preventing Schuchardt from defending the case. The Tennessee Supreme Court refused to allow Schuchardt to testify about the evidence of self-dealing in the case.

Schuchardt says that he has twice asked his opponent, Elaine Davis, to address the self-dealing at the ethics Board, and the failure of the Board to hold hearings. He says that Davis has refused to do so. Schuchardt is concerned that Davis may engage in a mud-throwing campaign in the election, which has no factual basis. “It is improper to use court opinions against me, when I was not allowed to call witnesses in the underlying case,” he says. He warns Davis that he has witnesses, who were not allowed to testify.

Schuchardt says that he is running for State Representative as a direct result of the attacks on his license, and Davis’s unwillingness to address the problems in the Tennessee Court system.

Schuchardt is running for office on other issues, as well.

Schuchardt is the author of America’s Achilles Heel: How to Protect Your Family When America Loses the Reserve Currency. The book argues that America’s currency – the U.S. dollar – is artificially-overvalued. He says that the world oil markets create artificial demand for the dollar, making the currency unreasonably expensive. “This has made us dependent on a wide array of imported goods,” he says.

Schuchardt says that the dollar could collapse in value, if the world were to trade oil in a new currency. He says that Tennessee needs to be aware of this risk, and prepare for the foreseeable consequences. This includes higher prices for imported goods, such as a gasoline, food, and imported cars.

Schuchardt studied law at Columbia Law School and government at Cornell University. He practiced law for nearly thirty years before running for office. He focused his legal practice on civil liberties issues in the courts.