According to an investigation by ProPublica magazine, the US Supreme Court’s most conservative justice, Clarence Thomas, has accepted lavish gifts financed by businessman Harlan Crow for more than 20 years without declaring them. ProPublica claimed to have interviewed “dozens of people” and reviewed internal documents to show that the justice department accepted lavish gifts from the businessman without reporting them. The Fix the Court association considered these revelations “astonishing” and stated that they confirm the need for a reform of the Supreme Court and stricter rules on gifts received by its members.
The friendship between the justice and the real estate mogul was already the subject of controversy in 2011, when the New York Times called it “unusual and ethically sensitive.” In addition, Clarence Thomas has been involved in other controversies, including his wife’s involvement in former Republican President Donald Trump’s crusade to prove, without evidence, that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. The left denounced an apparent conflict of interest and urged the judge to recuse himself from any election docket.
ProPublica also noted that Clarence Thomas goes almost every summer to a property of the businessman in the Adirondacks, in the state of New York, and that he accompanied him to the “Bohemian Grove” in California, an all-male club reserved for politicians, artists, celebrities, and businessmen. These revelations raise questions about the ethics and independence of Supreme Court justices and highlight the need for reforms in their functioning and controls.