---
key: process.review-disagreement-frontier-judge
title: 2026-07-21 — Review disagreement on a gate PR escalates to the frontier judge — and the proposed FIX escalates with it (#542)
status: active
since: '2026-07-21'
supersedes: none
superseded-by: none
rule: When independent reviews disagree on a gate PR, escalate to the frontier judge, and put the proposed fix approach in front of it — not just the disputed finding.
signals: 'review disagreement · frontier judge · escalate the fix not just the verdict · gate PR reconciliation · paths: n/a · issues: #542, #235'
mechanics: n/a — escalation is a routing decision by the orchestrator.
---

The reconciliation is not only "who is right about the finding". On #235 the frontier model ratified
the disputed High *and* caught that the orchestrator's own proposed fix (a per-source lock-or-skip over
a fixed loop order) would deterministically starve the 2nd and later media source — prescribing instead
the pattern that shipped.

That is the whole argument: a judge given only the verdict question would have returned "the High is
real" and let a starving fix ship. Send the fix approach up with the finding.
