We now know a little bit more about how Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas came to hire a law clerk with a known public history of racist statements.
According to the New York Times, beyond being one of the newest law clerks on the highest court in the land, Cyrstal Clayton is also a "nearly adopted" member of Clarence and Ginni Thomas' family:
They listed her on their family page in an annual printed clerk directory as their “nearly adopted daughter,” and prominently featured her in photos in the Thomases’ annual Christmas letters. During the “girls trip” to New York, Ms. Clanton joined the group at Broadway shows and in singing karaoke.
Thomas wrote in a 2021 letter, “and asked that she be allowed to live with us” after Clayton was removed from her leadership position with the far-right youth group Turning Points USA. She was forced out in 2017 after the New Yorker's Jane Mayer reported on overtly racist texts Clayton sent to her co-workers.
"I hate Black people ... I hate blacks. End of story," the group's national field director wrote.
After being ousted from the group led by Charlie Kirk, Clanton “was understandably distraught and depressed” and “felt overwhelmed and was ready to give up,” Thomas wrote in a letter on her behalf. “It was excruciating to watch her suffer so deeply, not knowing how to erase the smear or show that her life was not over.”
So she was invited to work for Ginni Thomas as a project manager at her political firm, Liberty Consulting, and "she lived with us for almost a year,” the justice wrote.
