The hits keep coming for ethics-challenged Justice Clarence Thomas. At a time when the credibility and objectivity of the Supreme Court are under attack, Thomas seems intent on demonstrating why public skepticism of the court is so richly merited. Court judges across the country at every other level of the justice system are bound by strict and enforceable ethics rules — but no such enforcement applies to the nation’s highest court, a fact that Thomas seems keenly aware of.
According to recent reports, Thomas has maintained an overly cozy financial relationship with Texas billionaire and GOP mega-donor Harlan Crow. It’s not clear whether Crow had any business indirectly before the court, but his vast wealth and political ties could not have gone unnoticed by Thomas as he was wined and dined. The mere appearance of a conflict of interest should have been enough for Thomas to decline such gifts. Instead, Thomas wallowed in them.
ProPublica reported early this month that Thomas and his wife, Ginni, were the guests on Crow’s private jet immediately after the Supreme Court wrapped up its 2019 term. The jet whisked them away to Indonesia, where they enjoyed nine days of vacation aboard Crow’s yacht. ProPublica estimated the value of the gift at $500,000. Thomas didn’t disclose any of it.
In 2014, Crow purchased the modest two-bedroom, one-bathroom house where Thomas’s 94-year-old mother was living in Savannah, Georgia, allowing her to live there afterward rent-free. Crow paid for expensive improvements.
Thomas should have reported it even if a strict interpretation of existing rules didn’t require it. But he didn’t. Nor did he report other expense-paid trips he received from Crow over the past two decades. Thomas explained the vacation in Indonesia as “personal hospitality” that he thought didn’t have to be reported. New disclosure rules make clear that they must be reported.
In 2011, Thomas acknowledged that he had erroneously stated on disclosure forms that Ginni Thomas had earned no outside income when, in fact, she had received nearly $700,000 for work with the conservative Heritage Foundation along with Hillsdale College and some Republican members of Congress. She has more recently been the focus of much controversy for appearing to support former President Donald Trump’s unfounded assertion that he was robbed of the 2020 presidential election.
The chances of Chief Justice John Roberts publicly condemning his colleague’s skirting of disclosure rules are almost nil. Thomas gets away with whatever he can, even if his court rulings suggest a rigid requirement that all others abide by both the spirit and the letter of the law. Inscribed over the court’s entrance are the words, “equal justice under the law.” Since Crow seems to be in a mood to pay for renovations these days, perhaps he could fund a more accurate update that reads: Money talks, and Clarence Thomas listens.
