Clarence Thomas officially admitted that he enjoyed expensive vacations paid for by conservative millionaire Harlan Crow, something the US Supreme Court justice has yet to acknowledge on record.
The right-leaning jurist has updated the court’s financial report to disclose a Crow-funded vacation to Indonesia and a men’s club in California, revising an earlier version.
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Crow paid for a hotel room in Bali, as well as food and housing in Sonoma County, California, which he only recently disclosed. He didn’t report any travel expenses incurred by anyone last year.
ProPublica first reported on the visits in April 2023, but Thomas had not previously mentioned them in court financial disclosure records, which are updated annually, despite publicly acknowledging the “hospitality.” This year’s Pulitzer Prize for Public Service went to ProPublica for its work on Thomas and Crow.
The filing provides only a brief explanation for why Thomas is now disclosing the charges. According to the report, “the filer sought and received guidance from his accountant and ethics counsel during the preparation and filing of this report.”
Following ProPublica’s reporting last year, Thomas issued a statement acknowledging his journey with Crow, but claiming Crow, a Republican mega-donor, had no business before the court. Earlier, Thomas claimed he received assurances that he didn’t need to document “such intimate hospitality” from close friends.
However, the Guardian last year linked Crow to the Club for Growth, a group that has lobbied the court with amicus papers while Thomas has been a member.
ProPublica also claimed that Thomas sold his mother’s Savannah, Georgia, home to Crow (Thomas disclosed the transaction last year after the article). Thomas also revealed that his wife, Ginni, earned money by consulting for several conservative organizations, according to Politico. Due to his wife’s right-wing connections, Thomas has faced pressure to disqualify himself in cases involving the January 6 attempt to overturn the 2020 election results, but he has so far refused.
Fix the Court, a monitoring group, found that Thomas received 103 gifts totaling $2.4 million. The total amount he received is ten times what his fellow justices received during the same time period.
Thomas’ association with Crow sparked calls for greater transparency from the justices. Last year, ProPublica reported that another conservative justice, Samuel Alito, flew on a private plane and vacationed with a millionaire whose business was before the court. Alito consistently requested a 90-day extension to file his report.
Alito was also under scrutiny when the New York Times reported that an upside-down US flag and an Appeal to Heaven flag were flying outside his Virginia house and a beach residence in New Jersey, respectively. The former is associated with the Capitol attack of January 6, while the latter is associated with Christian nationalism.
The Supreme Court’s nine justices agreed to a code of conduct last year, but several experts have pointed out that it is insufficient and difficult to enforce effectively.
The newest justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson, earned over $900,000 last year for her planned biography, making her one of four Supreme Court justices to record significant revenue from book deals. Jackson further revealed that Beyoncรฉ offered her four tickets valued at $3,700.
