Democrats Call For Supreme Court Ethics Reform And An Inquiry Into Clarence Thomas

Democratic lawmakers wrote a letter on Tuesday calling for a U.S. Supreme Court investigation into allegations of “ethical improprieties” against Justice Clarence Thomas, along with ethics reforms to prevent such violations in the future.

In the letter to Chief Justice John Roberts, Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) and 17 other lawmakers called for the establishment of an independent investigative body to better enforce the Supreme Court’s ethics rules.

The Democrats who signed the letter all previously worked as prosecutors, judges and law enforcement officials, according to NBC News, which first reported on the letter.

The group also urged the Supreme Court to create an ethics council to provide advice to justices on disclosure requirements, recusal and other ethics issues.

The recommendations were prompted by lawmakers’ concerns surrounding multiple allegations against Thomas and Justice Samuel Alito that were brought to light this year, along with the Supreme Court’s failure to internally investigate them.

In April, a ProPublica investigation revealed that Thomas had accepted luxury vacations and other gifts from Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow for more than 20 years. Crow also made a real estate purchase that benefited Thomas’ family and paid private school tuition for his grandnephew, who had been raised by the Thomases. Last year, reports from multiple news outlets also revealed an alleged conflict of interest related to Thomas’ wife, Ginni Thomas, and her support the efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.

This month, ProPublica also reported that Alito accepted a luxury fishing vacation in Alaska in 2008 from hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer, who appeared before the Supreme Court in at least 10 business disputes and repeatedly asked the Supreme Court to rule in his favor.

Alito offered a rebuttal to the ethics violation allegations against him in an opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal, which actually appeared before ProPublica’s report was published.

Both Thomas and Alito did not disclose the paid vacations and gifts in their annual financial statements, despite a federal law that requires gifts of transportation, among other benefits, to be disclosed by justices and most federal officials.

But the court has not yet launched an investigation into Thomas and did not further investigate separate allegations after The New York Times published a damning report alleging that Alito revealed to people over dinner how the Supreme Court would rule in a landmark case involving Hobby Lobby. Lawmakers criticized the court’s inaction in the letter, pointing to how quickly the Supreme Court launched an investigation last year into an early leak the Dobbs v. Jackson draft majority opinion.

“We agree that the Dobbs leak was a serious matter that jeopardized the legitimacy of the Supreme Court and merited investigation,” the letter said. “But the allegations against Justices Thomas and Alito similarly pose grave threats to the legitimacy of the Court.”

In a speech last month, Roberts said that he was “committed to making certain that we as a court adhere to the highest standards of conduct,” but he did not specify how that would be achieved.

“If, as you say, the Court is capable of upholding the highest ethical standards, then we hope you will accept our recommendations to establish an independent and transparent investigative body and separate ethics counsel to regain the trust and confidence of the American people,” lawmakers said in the letter.

The Supreme Court doesn’t have a binding code of conduct or an ethics office, ProPublica previously reported, and instead expects its justices to voluntarily adhere to the court’s “Statement of Ethics Principles and Practices,” according to the lawmakers’ letter.

The chief justice’s comments last month, along with the court’s failure to launch an investigation into Thomas’ failure to disclose valuable gifts, raised further concerns for lawmakers about the processes in place in the higher court to handle potential ethics violations.

“It has become abundantly clear to us that the current internal mechanism employed by the Court is not sufficient to prevent either the real, or appearance of, impropriety of its members or to hold to account justices who break ethics rules,” the letter stated.

It continued: “This has further undermined public confidence in the institution, which is now at an all-time low.”

The proposal echoes similar calls for greater accountability on the Supreme Court from Democratic senators earlier this year. In April, two senators introduced a bipartisan bill for the Supreme Court to establish an ethics code. Democrats have been pushing the legislation forward, despite opposition from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who has vowed to block it.

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• Justice Samuel Alito Took Luxury Fishing Vacation With GOP Billionaire Who Later Had Cases Before The Court