Honorable Rose Vela
Of Counsel - Corpus Christi & South Texas
BIOGRAPHY
Judge Rose Vela is a seasoned jurist and public servant with more than 37 years of experience in
law, politics, and government leadership. She has served with distinction in both the judicial and
executive branches at the state and federal levels.
Vela has been licensed to practice law in Texas since 1988. She began her career as a judicial law
clerk at two Texas Courts of Appeals before moving into private practice, where she handled
complex pre- and post-trial litigation and appeals alongside premier trial lawyers such as Guy
Allison (Allison & Huerta) and Darrell Barger (Barger & Moss).
In 1998, Vela was elected judge of the 148th District Court of Nueces County, Texas, where she served two full terms. During her eight years on the trial bench, she presided over thousands of complex jury and bench trials, including class actions, environmental and medical malpractice cases, and serious felony matters. Following her 2002 re-election, her colleagues selected her as Local Presiding Administrative Judge of Nueces County.
In 2006, Vela won a contested election to serve as an Associate Justice on the 13th Court of Appeals of Texas—the same court where she had clerked 15 years earlier. As an appellate justice, she participated in thousands of appeals from a 20‑county region in South Texas and authored hundreds of legal opinions. After choosing not to seek re-election in 2012, she continued to serve the judiciary as a Senior Assigned Judge in trial courts throughout Texas’ 4th and 5th Administrative Judicial Regions.
In 2021, President Joseph R. Biden appointed Vela as Director of the President’s Commission on White House Fellows. In that role, she worked closely with senior administration leaders, including Cabinet Secretaries and agency heads, and was entrusted with a TS/SCI security clearance.
A committed community leader, Vela was a founding member of Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) in Nueces County, supporting abused and neglected children in the court system. She also served on the founding board of the Corpus Christi Crime Control and Prevention District (Chair) and the Food Bank of Corpus Christi. Within the legal profession, her service includes the Nueces County Juvenile Board, the Nueces County Young Lawyers Association (President), the Texas Center for the Judiciary (Director), the College of the State Bar of Texas, the Texas Center for Legal Ethics and Professionalism, among others. Her civic and professional contributions have been recognized with numerous honors, including the Community Leaders Award (1999) from LULAC Council and the Las Estrellas Award (2005) from the Hispanic Women’s Network of Texas, Corpus Christi Chapter.
Vela has enhanced her judicial and leadership expertise through advanced professional programs, including the NYU College for Appellate Judges, the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, the National Judicial College, and the Texas College of Advanced Judicial Studies.The first in her family to earn a college degree, Vela worked continuously through high school, college, and law school to fund her education. In 2022, Texas State University named her an Outstanding Alumna in recognition of her exemplary career and public service.
