US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas vacationed for more than two decades on superyachts and private planes paid for by a Republican Party donor, in what may constitute a violation of anti-corruption law, ProPublica revealed Thursday.
Thomas, one of the Supreme Court’s most conservative justices and serving for life, accepted trips every year during that period from well-known Republican donor and real-estate magnate Harlan Crow, according to that nonprofit investigative journalism organization.
Their inquiries, based on interviews and internal documents, suggest that Thomas has traveled the world on Crow’s superyacht, traveled with him in his private plane, and she has gone with him to an exclusive men-only resort in Californiaas well as traveling to the tycoon’s ranch in East Texas.
Thomas also makes a habit of spending a week every summer at a private resort that Crow owns in the Adirondack Mountains in northeast New York state.
Many of these trips were also attended by the wife of magistrate and conservative activist Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, involved in the controversy for having pressured the chief of staff of former US President Donald Trump (2017-2021) to leave. annul the victory of Democrat Joe Biden in the 2020 elections.
The problem with all those trips is that Thomas did not include them in the financial reports that he must submit to the Supreme Court in compliance with an anti-corruption law that was passed after the Watergate scandal in the 1970s.
Following the revelations published by ProPublica, some members of the Democratic Party questioned his behavior.
One of the toughest was the leftist legislator Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who considered that Thomas should be subjected to an “impeachment” process (political trial), the only way that exists to remove a Supreme Court magistrate, since those charges they are for life.
“This degree of corruption It’s shocking, almost cartoonish,” he tweeted.
In addition, Democratic Senator Dick Durbin considered that the ProPublica information shows that the Supreme Court must be subject to regulations, like any other state body, and promised that the Senate Judiciary Committee, which he chairs, “will act.”
Durbin did not specify what actions his committee will take, but one of its powers is to call public hearings to examine cases like this one.
Thomas, 74, was appointed in 1991 by Republican President George HW Bush (1989-1993) and, during his more than thirty years on the Supreme Court, has held some of the most conservative positions on issues such as abortion rights.
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