Crow, Harlan

===

SEE HARLAN CROW THREE 12 23

see bak harlan

why? cleta citizens united quid pro quo?

russia trip clarence

An anonymous $500,000 donation to start up Liberty Central came from Harlan Crow, a Dallas real estate investor and Republican financier, Politico reported.

---

SEE HARLAN CROW 3

---

primary 4 23 on pro pub shitstorm

===

an july 2x? russia trip

Two Senate Democrats have published a list of roughly three dozen lavish gifts Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas received from right-wing billionaires during his time on the Court.

On the eve of the Independence Day holiday, Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) and Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) called on Attorney General Merrick Garland to appoint a special counsel to investigate Thomas for "possible violations of ethics and tax laws" in his "repeated and willful omissions" of gifts from wealthy benefactors.

"The scale of the potential ethics violations by Justice Thomas, and the willful pattern of disregard for ethics laws, exceeds the conduct of other government officials investigated by the Department of Justice for similar violations," Whitehouse and Wyden wrote. "The breadth of the omissions uncovered to date, and the serious possibility of additional tax fraud and false statement violations by Justice Thomas and his associates, warrant the appointment of a Special Counsel to investigate this misconduct."

On page 14 of the PDF Whitehouse posted to his Senate website, there are two lists of gifts to Thomas. The first list describes gifts from far-right real estate magnate Harlan Crow, and the second list shows gifts from other wealthy sponsors, like entrepreneur Anthony Welters — who "loaned" Thomas a luxury RV and then later forgave the loan — and billionaire Wayne Huizenga.

The gifts from Crow date back to 2003, and list excursions like "Yacht trip to Russia and the Baltics" and Helicopter to Yusipov Palace, St. Petersburg." Out of the roughly two dozen gifts Crow gave to Thomas, four are private school tuition payments for his grand-nephew. Many of Crow's other gifts were private jet flights and yacht cruises, including one Sens. Whitehouse and Wyden described as "around Greek islands."

And out of the gifts on the second list, three were from Huizenga, two were from Welters, and five were from former Berkshire Hathaway board member David Sokol. Billionaire Warren Buffett, who owns Berkshire Hathaway, forced Sokol out in 2011 after he learned that Sokol bought a stake in a company he later convinced Buffett's company to buy. Buffett called Sokol's actions "inexplicable" and "inexcusable."

"No government official should be above the law. Supreme Court justices are properly expected to obey laws designed to prevent conflicts of interest and the appearance of impropriety and to comply with the federal tax code," the senators wrote. "We therefore request that you appoint a Special Counsel authorized to investigate potential criminal violations by Justice Thomas under the disclosure, false statement, and tax laws; pursue leads of related criminal violations by donors, lenders and intermediate corporate entities; and determine whether any such loans and gifts were provided pursuant to a coordinated enterprise or plan."

In 2023, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Davide Cay Johnston commented that it was possible Thomas could face "criminal prosecution" by not paying taxes on the previously undisclosed gifts from Crow and others. He opined that any lower-level court judge would not be able to avoid the charges if they failed to pay taxes on gifts worth millions of dollars.

"What Clarence Thomas has done would result in not only any judges in America being removed from the bench, but there is a good chance it would result in criminal prosecution for income tax fraud and for false filings in his mandatory financial ethics disclosure statements," Johnston said in December.

Last month, anti-corruption watchdog group Fix the Court totaled Thomas' gifts and found that the conservative jurist had received approximately $4 million in gifts dating back to 2004 – far more than any other justice on the Supreme Court. And of the 193 gifts Thomas received, he only listed 27 on his required financial disclosure reports.

Click here to read Whitehouse and Wyden's full letter to Garland.

READ MORE:[Clarence Thomas discloses billionaire Harlan Crow paid for two luxury vacations after decades of trips

---

===

hypoc

an 12 23 no lnx

Busted: Jim Jordan and James Comer have a new judicial plan

Matt Laslo

andRaw Story

December 25, 2023

WASHINGTON – Republicans in Congress aren’t just doing all they can to impeach the Biden name – and possibly President Joe Biden himself – they’re also going to extraordinary lengths to protect two billionaire GOP megadonors who helped the party remake the Supreme Court in recent years.

For one, House Judiciary Committee Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-KY) are trying to stymie Washington, D.C. Attorney General Brian Schwalb’s investigation into Federalist Society co-chairman Leonard Leo.

Schwalb is looking into allegations that Leo is illegally profiting off non-profits. Jordan and Comer have responded by threatening to subpoena Schwalb.

ALSO READ: A neuroscientist’s guide to surviving Christmas with Trump-loving relatives

Meanwhile on the other side of the U.S. Capitol, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee walked out en masse, boycotting Democrats’ effort to subpoena Leo and Republican jurisprudence sugar daddy Harlan Crow over the hundreds of thousands of dollars in gifts he’s given to Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginni over the decades, according to a ProPublica investigation.

The GOP offensive to protect two billionaire donors is blatant hypocrisy, according to ethics watchdogs.

“There are many senators who will say anything. I mean, as long as it's their guy, they'll defend anything, and they have no consistency whatsoever and they're completely hypocritical,” Melanie Sloan, a senior adviser for nonpartisan watchdog American Oversight, told Raw Story.

ALSO READ: Florida judge’s son is a neo-Nazi patron: data leak

In today’s tribal and perpetually warring Congress, it seems even pay-to-play politics are now partisan. While Senate Republicans are vowing to use all procedural tools at their disposal to block Leo and Crow from being subpoenaed, most in the party are also backing the Biden impeachment inquiry because they say Hunter Biden was selling access to his father — an accusation for which they’ve provided no evidence to date.

On paper – paper stamped with GOP letterhead, mind you – the impeachment inquiry is focused on buying access.

“It better be, because, quite honestly, Hunter Biden's personal problems aren't the issue. The issue is whether he was selling access to a vice president willing to provide that access, and whether the vice president at the time – the current president – was enriched by it,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) told Raw Story.

As for the hundreds of thousands of dollars in private jet travel, stays at his private retreat and luxurious free vacations aboard his 162-foot yacht that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginni admitted to receiving from Harlan Crow?

“That's not enriching yourself, because you went on a boat ride for God's sake. That's not the same as cash in your checking account,” Cramer said of ProPublica’s revelations.

Cramer argues, if the trips weren’t free “maybe he wouldn't have gone on it.”

“The difference is … he’s a friend. Friends are allowed to provide hospitality for you in their home or on their boat. That's very different than a foreign adversary providing cash to a sitting vice president of the United States through his son. That's barely, barely even in the same ballpark, if at all,” Cramer said. “It’s a stretch, to say the least. It's just, it's not the same thing.”

That’s not even mentioning the free private school tuition Thomas’ nephew – who he raised like a son – received from Crow, which ProPublica estimates could have totaled upward of $150,000.

ALSO READ: Busted: These healthcare nonprofits are accepting millions from Big Tobacco

Senate Democrats, some of whom argue Thomas was in a prime position to rule on cases that effect Crow’s fortune, are particularly interested in whether Crow declared the lavish free vacations and travel as business expenses on his federal taxes.

For Leo – co-chairman of the Federalist Society, including the $1.6 billion fortune it now controls – Campaign for Accountability filed an IRS complaint alleging he’s funneling money from seven nonprofit entities he controls to his for-profit businesses, thus illegally profiting off campaign donations. The apparent interference from Jordan and Comer is appalling to watchdogs.

“Then, at the same time, they're screaming about the politicization of justice when they talk about Donald Trump, but they want to tell a sitting U.S. attorney – you know, the state's attorney for D.C. – who he can and can't look at because they don't want him looking at Leonard Leo,” Sloan said. “They just are bowing down at the altar of Leonard Leo and his $1.6 billion.”

House Republicans deny they’re interfering with an ongoing investigation.

“I’m confused. So it’s OK for Democrats to subpoena Leonard Leo and Harlan Crow, but not OK for us to look into AG Schwalb? Isn’t that literally the definition of a double standard — a.k.a Democrats can do something, but we can’t?” Russell M. Dye, communications director and counsel for the House Judiciary Committee, emailed Raw Story.

ALSO READ: ‘Too preposterous to be real’: College hires ‘pink slime’ publisher as journalism prof

Republicans say there’s no reason for an investigation, because the megadonors aren’t accused of trying to change the outcomes of specific cases before the Supreme Court.

“I really think there's like a fundamental difference here between trading favors and not, right? The difference here is the consideration. I've seen no evidence that any of the Supreme Court justices, least of all Clarence Thomas, offered to give anything back. To me, that’s the big difference,” Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) told Raw Story.

“Now look, if Harlan Crow or anybody else wrote $100 million to a Supreme Court Justice, and say, ‘Hey, please do this thing in my benefit’ — well, that raises some serious problems. But is it the standard that a Supreme Court justice can't have a rich friend?” Vance continued. “If they want to set that standard, it’s up to them, but I don't think that that raises nearly the same pay-to-play concerns as Joe Biden’s situation.”

Gifts are different than business appears to be the current GOP ethical standard for such matters.

“We're not talking about gifts. This is business. So with Hunter [Biden], this is, you know, he's on the Burisma board. He's doing these foreign business deals in Ukraine and China and lots of offices, and he is openly out there selling his dad,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) told Raw Story. “At the very least, he's clearly making money off his father. The question is, did the president benefit from that? That's what they need to answer. So that's why we have the inquiry.”

When pressed on the impeachment inquiry into Biden, former Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) wasn’t up to date on the specifics, even as he proudly remembers getting the investigative ball rolling for House Republicans.

“You’re talking about the substance of it. I’m not sure I can talk about the substance of it,” Grassley told Raw Story. “Except, the process is necessary to complete what [Sen. Ron] Johnson (R-WI) and I started four years ago, and that is to get all the information that Congress is entitled to in our oversight capacity and that's what it's all about, as far as I know.”

The Supreme Court adopted a new code of ethics since the lavish gifts were first reported, so Democrats’ complaints are outdated, Grassley argues.

ALSO READ: You blew it in New Hampshire, Joe Biden. Pray it doesn’t hurt you — and then some

“Because the judicial branch put out their … new regulation, and if that doesn’t take care of it – and we won't know that for a little while, maybe a year or two – then maybe that'd be a legitimate question,” Grassley said. “But right now it’s not a legitimate question considering the initiative of the Supreme Court.”

After all, 10 Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee walked out of the vote to subpoena Leo and Crow on November 30 – allowing Democrats to pass the measure 11-0 – Senate Republicans argue the vote broke committee rules.

“They’re not legal,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) told Raw Story. “Anybody who knows a lawbook from a J. Crew catalog knows they can get those subpoenas quashed in one hearing.”

Because of wholesale GOP opposition, there doesn’t seem to be the votes to formalize the subpoenas on the Senate floor where Republicans are threatening to require a 60-vote threshold.

“You’ll never see this come to the floor,” Judiciary Committee ranking member Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told Politico. “We’ll attack it legally, we’ll vote against it. It’d be a s—show.”

Even as the party hasn’t decided how it will proceed in the Senate, many Democrats expected this.

“We're going after the icons of the Republican Party, Leonard Leo, of course, and, to some, Justice Thomas. They’re very sensitive to that,” Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL) told Raw Story. “Public sentiment is overwhelmingly in our favor, so they have got to be strident in opposition.”

The two different standards for Biden and GOP donors is remarkable to Democrats.

“Republicans want to protect the court that they have packed, and they protect the court by maintaining its status as an unaccountable highest court of the land,” Rep. Hank Johnson (D-GA) told Raw Story. “It looks like they're doing everything they can to keep hidden the secret relationships that are going on at the court with powerful interests that bring cases before the court.”

To the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), this made-for-Fox-and-Newsmax drama shows how completely former President Donald Trump has remade the GOP in his own image.

“It is just sad the way that Donald Trump has completed his stranglehold over the Republican Party,” Raskin told Raw Story. “Donald Trump has taught them – from the Charlottesville riot forward – that there should be no enemies on the right. And they have no enemies on the right, and they will take no principled stance against anybody on the right, no matter how fascistic they are.”

===

---

an 11 23

...

Arno, Otten notes, is a "longtime consultant who specializes in ballot access," adding that "many of his previous clients have been much farther to the right than No Labels purports to be."

"In 2017," according to Otten, "Arno worked for the Virginia Republican gubernatorial candidate Corey Stewart, who made a name for himself in part by embracing white nationalism and the Confederacy…. Stewart's campaign paid Arno's California-based firm Arno Petition Consultants $47,975 for various services, including door-knocking and petitioning for Stewart as a candidate…. Arno Petition Consultants also provided ballot access consulting to Ted Cruz and Rand Paul when the senators ran for president in 2016…. In 2005, the conservative Christian organization Massachusetts Family Institute hired Arno Petition Consultants to help get an initiative on the state ballot to ban same-sex marriage."

Otten points out that No Labels has "accepted more than $100,000 from" billionaire Harlan Crow, known for his close ties to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

---

why?

An anonymous $500,000 donation to start up Liberty Central came from Harlan Crow, a Dallas real estate investor and Republican financier, Politico reported.

---

an 11 23

the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved subpoenas for conservative billionaire Harlan Crow and the Federalist Society's Leonard Leo despite loud objections from the committee's Republican members.

Axios reported that during the roll call for the subpoenas, Republicans repeatedly "shouted objections." Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) was quoted yelling "come on, man" as chairman Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) conducted the vote. Punchbowl News reporter Heather Caygle tweeted that Republicans then "left the room during the vote."

The chaos started after Durbin moved to suspend rule IV, which allows for debate, in order to move directly to the subpoena vote. Republicans were upset, claiming debate over the confirmation of judicial nominees was being prematurely stifled. Durbin responded that the committee had already debated the nominees "at great length" during a prior hearing before moving ahead with the rule IV motion.

"You're going to have a lot of consequences coming if you go down this road," Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) told the committee. "Listen to me, I've cautioned a lot of you."

"So you're telling us to shut up? You want us to shut up? That's what you're saying," Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tennessee) said to Durbin.

Even though the uproar in the committee was ostensibly over the process of debating judicial nominees, a Senate Republican aide speaking anonymously to Axios told the publication that senators' anger was more in relation to the subpoenas of Crow and Leo.

:{:{The Senate Judiciary Committee ordered the subpoenas for both Harlan Crow and Leonard Leo in relation to Crow's numerous undisclosed gifts to Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, and Leo's facilitation of those gifts. Currently, all federal judges — including members of the Supreme Court – are banned from receiving gifts and compensation for speeches and public appearances under the Ethics Reform Act of 1989.}:

"Leo’s efforts to keep Thomas happy meant 38 destination vacations, a voyage on a yacht around the Bahamas, 26 private jet flights (plus eight by helicopter), a dozen VIP passes to professional and college sporting events (typically sitting in a box), two stays at luxury resorts in Florida and Jamaica, and a standing invitation to an exclusive golf club overlooking the Atlantic coast," Gertner wrote. "Most of these were arranged by Leo and paid for by conservative billionaires."

---

an 8 23

former New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie's super PAC has taken donations from GOP megadonors Anthony Scaramucci and Harlan Crow, who came under scrutiny earlier this year for providing luxurious gifts to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, CNN reports.

Christie, who announced his presidential bid last month, has been condemned by some of his fellow Republicans over openly and repeatedly criticizing former President Donald Trump amid his legal troubles, as well as his less conservative views on culture war issues.

However, according to CNN, the former governor's harsh critiques have not prevented him from receiving financial support from several high-profile GOP donors like Crow and Scaramucci, who each donated $100,000 to Tell It Like It Is PAC.

The news outlet notes Murray Kushner, uncle to Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also contributed $100,000 to the PAC.

Aside from the pair's contributions, CNN reports:

The Tell It Like It Is PAC reported receiving nearly $5.9 million in the first half of 2023, according to a report it filed Monday with Federal Election Commission. It only reported receiving contributions between May 30 and June 30 in this filing.

Additionally, the report notes the PAC's "single largest donation was $1 million from a limited liability company called SHBT LLC that was established last year in Texas.

---

https://www.alternet.org/Bank/harlan-crow-2661754333/

no lnx guk

an 6 23

senate Judicial Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) has been forcefully calling for the U.S. Supreme Court to adopt a code of ethics. According to Durbin, reports from ProPublica on Justice Clarence Thomas' close relationship with billionaire GOP donor Harlan Crow and Justice Samuel Alito's alliance with Paul Singer — another billionaire Republican — make a compelling argument for the Court to adopt an ethics code in order to save its "reputation."

:{:{}:

In an article published by the Guardian on June 23, reporter Stephanie Kirchgaessner emphasizes that the Thomas/Crow controversy is fueling tensions between Crow and Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

"A lawyer for Crow admitted, in a recent letter to Sen. Ron Wyden, the Democratic chairman of the (Senate) Finance Committee, that it was his understanding that expenses associated with luxury flights and yacht trips for Thomas were paid back to Crow's 'family entities' at rates 'prescribed by law,'" Kirchgaessner explains. "But the lawyer — Michael Bopp, a partner at Gibson Dunn who specializes in representing clients in congressional and government investigations — did not provide any information about who made the payments, and when."

READ MORE: Conflicts of interest': Senate Judiciary chair urges John Roberts to adopt Supreme Court ethics code

Wyden, Kirchgaessner notes, is accusing Crow of "stonewalling" questions from the Senate about gifts he made to Thomas and members of his family. ProPublica has reported that Crow not only treated Thomas to luxury vacations, but also, paid the private school tuition for one of Thomas' relatives.

Steve Rosenthal of the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center told The Guardian, "The key question, at least so far, is: Should Clarence Thomas have reported the luxury items he is being given by a billionaire?…. You might want to know, how much did Harlan Crow value these plane rides, yacht trips, tuition payments? We don't know a lot of information."

READ MORE: Durbin and legal experts rip Crow lawyer’s claim that Senate lacks authority to probe Thomas gifts

Read The Guardian's full report at this link.

FROM YOUR SITE ARTICLES

'Comedic level of corruption': Clarence Thomas’s relationship with Harlan Crow based on 'cozying up' ›

'Garbage like his garden of evil': Experts shred Harlan Crow’s 'dumb' letter to Senate Judiciary Committee ›

Harlan Crow’s lawyer agrees to meet with Senate Judiciary members ›

RELATED ARTICLES AROUND THE WEB

Justice Thomas: SCOTUS 'should reconsider' contraception, same ... ›

A Timeline Of Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill Controversy As ... ›

Clarence Thomas has waited over 30 years for this moment | CNN ... ›

---

ref badash 11/22

https://www.thenewcivilrightsmovement.com/2022/11/they-had-an-insider-on-scotus-legal-experts-stunned-by-bombshell-clarence-thomas-was-seen-as-key-by-trump-lawyers/

Washington Post bombshell revealing Trump attorneys saw Justice Clarence Thomas as the key to getting the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the 2020 election is leaving several legal experts stunned.

The Post reports eight emails “ordered released by U.S. District Judge David O. Carter of California, include correspondence between Trump lawyers Kenneth Chesebro, John Eastman and others discussing various legal strategies to convince Republican members of Congress to object to the official certification of electoral votes in a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6, 2021.”

In one email “from Chesebro to Eastman and several others sent on Dec. 31, 2020, Chesebro argued that [U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence] Thomas would ‘end up being key’ to asking the high court to overturn then-President-elect Joe Biden’s win in contested states.”

The Post states the email also says, “they should ‘frame things so that Thomas could be the one to issue some sort of stay or other circuit justice opinion saying Georgia is in legitimate doubt.'”

Politico’s Kyle Cheney sums up the scheme.

“Chesebro made the plan explicit: Get any remotely favorable ruling from a federal judge — not to win outright but to embolden GOP state legislatures, Congress or Pence to reverse the results.”

Politico‘s reporting includes copies of the redacted emails, and adds: “Chesebro contended that Thomas would be ‘our only chance to get a favorable judicial opinion by Jan. 6, which might hold up the Georgia count in Congress.'”

“I think I agree with this,” Eastman replied.

“Eastman,” Politico notes, “an architect of Trump’s last-ditch bid to subvert the 2020 election, once clerked for Thomas and had corresponded with his wife, Virginia, in the weeks before Jan. 6.”

“[I]f we can just get this case pending before the Supreme Court by Jan. 5,” Chesebro wrote in one email, “ideally with something positive written by a judge or justice, hopefully Thomas, I think it’s our best shot at holding up the count of a state in Congress.”

Richard Signorelli, a former Asst. U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) blasted both the Supreme Court Justice and his far right wing activist wife, Ginni Thomas.

“They had a damn insider on SCOTUS who they thought would help them overthrow our democracy,” Signorelli tweeted. “He’s married to a deranged MAGA cult member. He won’t even recuse himself.”

Former Harvard Constitutional Law professor Laurence Tribe blasted Chesebro.

“We now learn that Ken Chesebro saw Justice Thomas as Trump’s ‘only chance’ to stop the 2020 election from being duly certified. Such abhorrent abuse of an attorney’s license to practice law should be strictly disciplined and perhaps criminally prosecuted,” he tweeted.

Attorney and writer Rachel Solar, pointing to the Politico article asks: “When is it enough???? His wife is an insurrectionist He refuses to recuse He’s the Trump election-denial go-to? Come on.”

Journalist Helen Kennedy goes one step further.

“Hey look! It wasn’t just critics of the Supreme Court who thought Clarence Thomas was corrupted – Trump’s lawyers said so too in secret emails just revealed.”

===}}:

---

MARTENS

...Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas,who was firing off all of those emails to Trump’s White House Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, to press for the attempted coup, had previously received$1,051,214 in compensation from the Heritage Foundationover a number of years. Clarence Thomas failed to report that compensation on his financial disclosure forms at the Supreme Court, even though he was required to do so.

The ties between Ginni Thomas and another attempted coup collaborator, Cleta Mitchell, run deep – with all roads leading to Koch money. As we reported in March:

In the emails that Ginni Thomas sent to Trump’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, one of the people that she told Meadows to listen to was attorney Cleta Mitchell – a woman who has both a longstanding association with Ginni Thomas as well as with Koch front groups. Trump’s phone log for January 6 shows that Cleta Mitchell was one of the people that Trump spoke with at 7 :53 p.m. on the evening of the attack on the Capitol.

Cleta Mitchell has been in the news previously as the lawyer who was on the January 2, 2021 call with Donald Trump when he phoned the Secretary of State of Georgia, Brad Raffensperger, and told him: “I only need 11,000 votes. Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break.” That call took place two months after the presidential election. (Mitchell stepped down from her long-term employment at law firm Foley & Lardner after her presence on that call was made public.)

Cleta Mitchell is also the attorney who filed an amicus brief in the Citizens United case before the Supreme Court that was decided on January 21, 2010. That case would be the tipping point to allow unlimited sums from corporations – like Koch Industries — in U.S. elections.

Just eight days after Justice Thomas voted in favor of that decision to open the floodgates to corporate money in campaigns, Cleta Mitchell made a move that looked very much like a quid pro quo to Ginni Thomas. Mitchell, then still a partner at Foley & Lardner, filed an application with the Internal Revenue Service to set up a nonprofit called Liberty Central, Inc. on behalf of Ginni Thomas. According to IRS tax filings, Liberty Central received a combined $1.478 million from dark money donors in 2009 and 2010.

On the IRS tax filings for Liberty Central for 2009 and 2010, Ginni (Virginia) Thomas is listed as President and CEO. The 2010 tax filing shows that Ginni Thomas received $120,511 in compensation from Liberty Central that year. She eventually stepped down from an official post at the nonprofit, stating she would serve as a consultant.

Liberty Central had the fingerprints of Charles Koch all over it. Acting as General Counsel in 2010 for Liberty Central was a former lawyer for the Charles G. Koch Foundation, Sarah Field. A former Koch lobbyist, Matt Schlapp, served on the Board of Liberty Central at inception.

Mitchell’s law firm, Foley & Lardner, employed three attorneys working as lobbyists for a Koch Industries affiliate, Koch Companies Public Sector, LLC in Madison, Wisconsin in 2011. The Koch-related lobbyists were Ray Carey, Jason Childress and Kathleen Walby.

Mitchell was a former lobbyist at the federal level in years 2005 through 2008 for the Alliance for Charitable Reform, a project of The Philanthropy Roundtable, another tax-exempt organization. Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund, two dark money groups which also have Charles Koch’s fingerprints all over them, were spun off from the Philanthropy Roundtable in 1999. (See our report: Koch Footprints Lead to Secret Slush Fund to Keep Fear Alive.)

The financial disclosure forms filed by Clarence Thomas show that from 2011 through 2017, Ginni Thomas received a “salary” from the Daily Caller, a right-wing spin organization founded in 2010 by Fox News commentator Tucker Carlson and former Dick Cheney aide Neil Patel. Its creation was announced at a gathering at the Heritage Foundation. The Daily Caller’s affiliated News Foundation has received funding from the Koch Family Foundations and the Charles Koch Institute.

Despite the previous scandal over Clarence Thomas failing to report that Ginni Thomas had received income from the Heritage Foundation, there are no dollar ranges listed on his financial disclosure forms to show the range of “salary” Ginni Thomas actually received from the Daily Caller from 2011 to 2017.

From 2011 through 2020, Clarence Thomas shows that his wife was receiving “salary and benefits” from Liberty Consulting. But again, there is no range of salary and benefits shown. Instead, Liberty Consulting is listed under “Investments” and shows a “book value” of $100,000 to $250,000 in 2019, which then drops to $15,000 to $50,000 in 2020....[CONLON CORKERY?]

---

https://www.alternet.org/2022/08/kyrsten-sinema/

Senate Democrats passed a pared-backed reconciliation package on Sunday, but only after a pair of widely supported provisions that would have made it harder for Wall Street tycoons to reduce their tax bills were removed at the behest of Sen. Kyrsten Sinema—the right-wing Arizona Democrat who has taken more than $500,000 in campaign contributions from private equity executives during the current election cycle.

"Remember the days when taking half a million bucks from an industry, and then passing legislation that only benefits that industry, while passing the costs onto everyone else, would be called corruption?" Brown University political economist Mark Blyth asked on social media. "Today it's just lobbying as usual."

:{:{}:

Last week, Sinema agreed to back the Inflation Reduction Act as long as the so-called "carried interest loophole," which benefits hedge fund managers and private equity moguls by allowing their investment income to be taxed at the long-term capital gains rate of around 20% rather than the ordinary top income rate of 37%, was preserved.

Democrats, who needed Sinema's support to pass the filibuster-proof bill through the evenly split Senate, obliged, forgoing a modest reform that would have raised an estimated $14 billion in federal revenue over a decade by increasing the holding period for investments to qualify for preferential tax treatment from three to five years.

As the Financial Times noted Monday, the Arizona Democrat "is a beneficiary of significant contributions from the private equity industry—whose lobbying machine and political influence have grown increasingly powerful over the past two decades."

Citing Federal Election Commission filings, the newspaper reported:

Sinema has received more than half a million dollars in campaign donations from private equity group executives in this election cycle alone, representing about 10% of her fundraising from individual donors. This includes individual donations totalling $54,900 from executives at KKR, $35,000 from Carlyle, $27,300 from Apollo, $24,500 from Crow Holdings Capital and $23,300 from Riverside Partners.

The securities and investment sector as a whole has donated more than $2.2 million to Sinema since she was elected in 2017,according to OpenSecrets. Former U.S. Labor Secretary Robert Reich quipped last week, amid reports of Sinema's plans to undermine her party's efforts to hike taxes on corporations and the wealthy, that Wall Street is "getting a huge return on their investment."

In addition to stripping the carried interest provision from the Inflation Reduction Act, Sinema protected private equity-owned corporations from a new 15% minimum tax on billion-dollar firms.

As The Washington Post reported Sunday:

As originally written, the provision would have required private equity firms to tally profits from their various holdings and pay the tax if the total exceeded the $1 billion threshold.

Sinema, who for over a year has blocked Democratic ambitions to raise taxes, raised objections on Saturday, according to two people with knowledge of the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private talks. The senator argued that, without changes to the bill, small and medium-sized businesses that happen to be owned by private equity firms would be exposed to the tax, violating a Democratic pledge to hike taxes only on the largest firms. A Sinema spokeswoman said several Arizona small businesses, including a plant nursery, had raised concerns.

Steve Wamhoff, an analyst at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, a progressive think tank, told the Post, "The idea that billion-dollar private equity funds must be protected to save small businesses is absolutely absurd."

:{:{}:

Nevertheless, the newspaper noted, "the last-minute changes mark a significant victory for the private equity industry and an estimated savings of $35 billion over the next decade."

Following the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act on Sunday, the progressive tax reform group Patriotic Millionaires ran a mobile billboard around the Capitol to thank Senate Democrats, with the exception of Sinema, who was denounced for being bought by private equity billionaires. The truck made stops at the offices of the American Investment Council and the Carlyle Group in Washington, D.C.

"Bravo to 49 of the 50 senators who voted today to end an era of rampant criminal tax abuse at the highest levels of American society and American business," Erica Payne, founder and president of Patriotic Millionaires, said in a statement. "In a journey of 1,000 miles, this is an impressive first step."

"Shame on Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, who had to be dragged kicking and screaming across the finish line, carrying water for her private equity overloads to the bitter end," Payne continued. "Thanks in large part to Sinema's obstruction, there's more work to be done, but the Inflation Reduction Act is a monumental step in the right direction."

---

no lnx twt

Kyrsten Sinema is raking in cash from GOP and fossil fuel donors — but it may not be enough to win re-election

Meaghan Ellis February 01, 2022

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) is amassing a sizable war chest as a result of Republican donors, according to new financial disclosures. But a new analysis explains why money may not even be enough to secure Sinema's re-election.

According to new Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings, the lawmaker raked in approximately $1.6 million in the 4th quarter of 2021. The New York Times' Shane Goldmacher recently took to Twitter with details about the donations Sinema has received as he revealed the names of some of her biggest donors.

Per The Rolling Stone, Goldmacher noted that Sinema's big donors include: "Harlan Crow, a massive GOP donor the Texas Tribune called 'one of the biggest whales in the country'; Ken Langone, another massive GOP donor who felt 'betrayed' by Trump and switched to Biden; Nelson Peltz, the aforementioned Manchin confidante; andMiguel B. 'Mike' Fernandez, a Florida health care billionairewho threw his fortune behind Hillary in 2016 after Jeb Bush fizzled out."

In addition to the donors Goldmacher listed, Sinema has attracted Republican fossil fuel donors like Continental Resources chairman Harold Hamm and ConocoPhillipsCEO Ryan Lance. Republican voters have also applauded Sinema for her adamant support of the Senate filibuster.

But despite raking in the big bucks, Sinema still faces a number of obstacles that could compromise her chances of re-election. According to the analysis written by The Intelligencer's Ed Kilgore, money from Republican donors won't necessarily help Sinema win over Democratic voters. In fact, Kilgore explains why Sinema's war chest likely will not prove to be beneficial on the Republican side either.

Kilgore argues that Sinema's moderate stance on key issues and voting record won't be enough to win unwavering support from Republican voters.

"Trouble is, smiling upon a pol for screwing up the hated opposition party’s agenda is not the same as voting to reelect her," Kilgore wrote. "According to FiveThirtyEight’s analysis of Sinema’s voting during her two years in the Senate when Trump was president, she voted with the 45th president half the time. That was about the same as Manchin’s level, but far lower than nearly all Republicans. The GOP is a party with extremely low tolerance for dissidence."

Voter registration is another barrier. "The Republican voters who give Sinema favorable ratings can’t cross over to support her in a Democratic primary," Kilgore explained, adding, "and aren’t going to vote for her in a general election against an actual Republican."

Sinema could also end up splitting the vote with a Democratic opponent that hopes to unseat her. But Kilgore is confident about one thing. He wrote, "Whether you view her as a brave and principled dissident or a scurrilous traitor, Sinema is probably, from a political point of view, toast."

---

===

Harlan R. Crow of Dallas, Texas, is a longtime Republican benefactor.

The son of Dallas real estate magnate Trammell Crow, Harlan Crow is the owner of Crow Realty Investors, as well as the president of another real estate concern, Crow Holdings. Crow Holdings owns almost 10% of the shares of the Trammell Crow real estate company.[1] Crow is also listed as a managing partner of Crow Family Holdings, as well. [2]

For his generous contributions to the George Herbert Walker Bush Presidential Library, Crow was named a trustee. Other trustees include such Republican luminaries such as Florida governor Jeb Bush and former Secretary of State James A. Baker III . [3]

Harlan Crow is also trustee of the American Enterprise Institute and a major patron of Associate Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. In 2002, Justice Thomas reported receiving a gift of a "Frederick Douglass Bible," valued at $19,000, from Harlan and Kathy Crow, whom he described as "personal friends." [4]

Crow has an unusual hobby of collecting statues of both past and present tyrants, including Vladimir Lenin and Fidel Castro. His home in Dallas purportedly contains one of the world's largest statuaries on its grounds, with 20 statues ranging up to 20 feet tall [5] [6]

"Crow is a member of the founders committee of the Club for Growth , a conservative political group that raises money uses it to influence public policy and elect political candidates who advocate the 'Reagan vision of limited government and lower taxes.' " [7]

Director, National Center for Policy Analysis
CEO, Crow Holdings

SourceWatch Resources

Swift Boat Veterans for Truth Republican Connection

---

clARENCE Thomas, too, has put his judicial imprimatur on the Koch boys' annual plutocratic political gathering. He addressed their 2008 getaway at a Palm Springs resort, apparently enjoying four days there on the tab of the Koch-funded Federalist Society. He also is closely tied to the Heritage Foundation, which is richly financed by the Kochs

. In 2009, he was the featured draw at a fundraiser for the group, which often takes part in Supreme Court cases--and which employed Thomas' wife, Ginny, from 2003-2007, paying her $686,000 that the justice "inadvertently omitted" from his financial disclosure filings.

In addition, Thomas is corruptly entangled with Dallas real estate billionaire and right-wing political funder Harlan Crow. Even though Crow's financial and political interests are directly affected by the high court's rulings, Thomas has been injudiciously accepting a steady flow of gifts from the tycoon, including: a $175,000 donation from Crow to a Georgia library project dedicated to Thomas; a $2.8 million gift for an historic preservation project being developed under Thomas' supervision near his childhood home; and a $500,000 donation to Thomas' wife, Ginny, last year so she could start a tea party lobbying and political group (which, by the way, takes an aggressive partisan stance on legal questions that will soon come up for Justice Thomas' consideration, including Obama's health care law).

Good grief! Is there no code of ethics outlawing such rank conflicts of interest for federal judges? Yes. But, conveniently, Supreme Court justices have been exempted from the code.

lowdown

---

http://www.alternet.org/story/151889/how_a_corporatist_supreme_court_cabal_joined_forces_with_right_wing_and_kochs_to_quietly_sell_out_our_democracy/?page=3

hightower

http://web.archive.org/web/20121011062630/https://www.alternet.org/story/151889/how_a_corporatist_supreme_court_cabal_joined_forces_with_right_wing_and_kochs_to_quietly_sell_out_our_democracy/

Hightower Lowdown / By Jim Hightower

How a Corporatist Supreme Court Cabal Joined Forces With Right Wing and Kochs to Quietly Sell Out Our Democracy

Corrupt, right-wing Supreme Court justices are abusing their power, fraternizing with the Koch brothers and fixing elections (among other horrors).

August 5, 2011 |

Bill Watterson is Mark Twain--with a drawing pen. He is a master cartoonist, but also a sharp-witted observer of the absurd, with an impish sense of humor. From 1985-1995, Watterson penned "Calvin and Hobbes," the truly marvelous comic strip that featured six-year-old Calvin and his stuffed tiger Hobbes. In Calvin's inventive and iconoclastic mind, Hobbes was a genuine tiger (and his best friend) and they shared boundless adventures that challenged conventional thinking and defied authority, often crashing right through the prescribed social order of the 'real' world.

A recurring theme in the strip was a two-player baseball competition in which both the kid and the tiger simply made up the rules as they went. In one strip, Calvin has hit the ball thrown by Hobbes, and he's scampering toward home plate:

Calvin: Ha Ha! A home run!

Hobbes: You didn't touch all the bases!

Calvin: I did, too.

Hobbes: No, you didn't. You didn't touch seventh base.

Calvin: Yes, I did! I touched the water barrel right after the front porch.

Hobbes: That's not seventh base. That's twelfth base!

Calvin: I thought the garage door was twelfth.

Hobbes: The garage door is twenty-third base. You touched them all out of order, and you didn't touch the secret base.

Calvin: The secret base?? What's the secret base?!

Hobbes: I can't tell you. It's a secret.

That exchange between a six-year-old and a stuffed tiger pretty well sums up the nonsensical political gamesmanship being played out today by the five-man lineup of corporatists on the Supreme Court: Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Samuel Alito, Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, and Clarence Thomas. They are on an unrestrained ideological tear, making up their own rules to score big points for corporate power. Reasoning? Try twenty-third base! Precedent? Throw it out! History? Rewrite it! The Constitution? Slide by it! Judicial restraint? Only for liberals! Logic? That's a secret! The rule of law? The law is us!

Only, this isn't a game. Barely six years into Roberts' tenure, he and his narrow majority have thoroughly politicized the Court. The one branch of our national government that was intentionally designed by the Founders to set the rule of law above politics has been turned into another political front group to advance corporate rule. The Constitution granted life tenure to the justices specifically so they could feel free to stand up to wealthy wrongdoers--particularly those avaricious business schemers who wanted to endanger the people's rule by establishing, as Jefferson put it, "the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations."

Hiding under robes

"Leveling the playing field can sound like a good thing. But in a democracy, campaigning for office is not a game." --Chief Justice John Roberts, fumbling a sports metaphor in a June ruling that does, indeed, tilt the political field to assure that corporate-backed players win the crucial money game.

In case after case, the five hard-core Republicans of the Roberts Court have been chopping furiously at the hard-earned legal rights of workers, consumers, voters, and others who dare to challenge the power of big business elites to reign over us, both politically and economically. There has been way too little public attention focused on (much less a sustained political challenge to) what has become a spectacular abuse of government power. A survey last year by the Pew Center found that nearly three-fourths of Americans have no idea who John Roberts is . Eight percent named Thurgood Marshall as the chief justice (and I certainly wish he was, even though he's been dead for 18 years)....

---

nyt

Friendship of Justice and Magnate Puts Focus on Ethics

Justice Clarence Thomas was given a $15,000 bust of Lincoln in 2001 by a group for which a friend is a trustee.

By Mike McIntire

June 18, 2011

PIN POINT, Ga. — Clarence Thomas was here promoting his memoir a few years ago when he bumped into Algernon Varn, whose grandfather once ran a seafood cannery that employed Justice Thomas’s mother as a crab picker.

Mr. Varn lived at the old cannery site, a collection of crumbling buildings on a salt marsh just down the road from a sign heralding this remote coastal community outside Savannah as Justice Thomas’s birthplace. The justice asked about plans for the property, and Mr. Varn said he hoped it could be preserved.

“And Clarence said, ‘Well, I’ve got a friend I’m going to put you in touch with,’ ” Mr. Varn recalled, adding that he was later told by others not to identify the friend.

The publicity-shy friend turned out to be Harlan Crow, a Dallas real estate magnate and a major contributor to conservative causes. Mr. Crow stepped in to finance the multimillion-dollar purchase and restoration of the cannery, featuring a museum about the culture and history of Pin Point that has become a pet project of Justice Thomas’s.

The project throws a spotlight on an unusual, and ethically sensitive, friendship that appears to be markedly different from those of other justices on the nation’s highest court.

The two men met in the mid-1990s, a few years after Justice Thomas joined the court. Since then, Mr. Crow has done many favors for the justice and his wife, Virginia, helping finance a Savannah library project dedicated to Justice Thomas, presenting him with a Bible that belonged to Frederick Douglass and reportedly providing $500,000 for Ms. Thomas to start a Tea Party-related group. They have also spent time together at gatherings of prominent Republicans and businesspeople at Mr. Crow’s Adirondacks estate and his camp in East Texas.

In several instances, news reports of Mr. Crow’s largess provoked controversy and questions, adding fuel to a rising debate about Supreme Court ethics. But Mr. Crow’s financing of the museum, his largest such act of generosity, previously unreported, raises the sharpest questions yet — both about Justice Thomas’s extrajudicial activities and about the extent to which the justices should remain exempt from the code of conduct for federal judges.

Although the Supreme Court is not bound by the code, justices have said they adhere to it. Legal ethicists differed on whether Justice Thomas’s dealings with Mr. Crow pose a problem under the code. But they agreed that one facet of the relationship was both unusual and important in weighing any ethical implications: Justice Thomas’s role in Mr. Crow’s donation for the museum.

The code says judges “should not personally participate” in raising money for charitable endeavors, out of concern that donors might feel pressured to give or entitled to favorable treatment from the judge. In addition, judges are not even supposed to know who donates to projects honoring them.

While the nonprofit Pin Point museum is not intended to honor Justice Thomas, people involved in the project said his role in the community’s history would inevitably be part of it, and he participated in a documentary film that is to accompany the exhibits.

Deborah L. Rhode, a Stanford University law professor who has called for stricter ethics rules for Supreme Court justices, said Justice Thomas “should not be directly involved in fund-raising activities, no matter how worthy they are or whether he’s being centrally honored by the museum.”

On the other hand, the restriction on fund-raising is primarily meant to deter judges from using their position to pressure donors, as opposed to relying on “a rich friend” like Mr. Crow, said Ronald D. Rotunda, who teaches legal ethics at Chapman University in California.

“I don’t think I could say it’s unethical,” he said. “It’s just a very peculiar situation.”

Justice Thomas, through a Supreme Court spokeswoman, declined to respond to a detailed set of questions submitted by The New York Times. Mr. Crow also would not comment.

Supreme Court ethics have been under increasing scrutiny, largely because of the activities of Justice Thomas and Ms. Thomas, whose group, Liberty Central, opposed President Obama’s health care overhaul — an issue likely to wind up before the court. Mr. Crow’s donation to Liberty Central was reported by Politico.

In January, the liberal advocacy organization Common Cause asked the Justice Department to investigate whether Justices Thomas and Antonin Scalia should have recused themselves from last year’s Citizens United campaign finance case because they had attended a political retreat organized by the billionaire Koch brothers, who support groups that stood to benefit from the court’s decision.

A month later, more than 100 law professors asked Congress to extend to Supreme Court justices the ethics code that applies to other federal judges, and a bill addressing the issue was introduced.

It is not unusual for justices to accept gifts or take part in outside activities, some with political overtones.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer has attended Renaissance Weekend, a retreat for politicians, artists and media personalities that is a favorite of Democrats, including former President Bill Clinton. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg participated in a symposium sponsored by the National Organization for Women’s Legal Defense and Education Fund, and a philanthropic foundation once tried to give her a $100,000 achievement award. She instructed that the money be given to charity.

[Algernon Varn, whose grandfather once ran a seafood cannery where Justice Clarence Thomas's mother worked, on the site of the old cannery. Mr. Varn said Justice Thomas put him in touch with a buyer to restore the property and build a museum.]

But in the case of Justice Thomas and his dealings with Mr. Crow, the ethical complications appear more complex.

Conservative Ties

Mr. Crow, 61, manages the real estate and investment businesses founded by his late father, Trammell Crow, once the largest landlord in the United States. The Crow family portfolio is worth hundreds of millions of dollars and includes investments in hotels, medical facilities, public equities and hedge funds.

A friend of the Bush family, Mr. Crow is a trustee of the George Bush Presidential Library Foundation and has donated close to $5 million to Republican campaigns and conservative groups. Among his contributions were $100,000 to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the group formed to attack the Vietnam War record of Senator John Kerry, the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate, and$500,000 to an organization that ran s urging the confirmation of President George W. Bush’s nominees to the Supreme Court.

Mr. Crow has not personally been a party to Supreme Court litigation, but his companies have been involved in federal court cases, including four that went to the appellate level. And he has served on the boards of two conservative organizations involved in filing supporting briefs in cases before the Supreme Court. One of them, the American Enterprise Institute, with Mr. Crow as a trustee, gave Justice Thomas a bust of Lincoln valued at $15,000 and praised his jurisprudence at an awards gala in 2001.

The institute’s Project on Fair Representation later filed briefs in several cases, and in 2006 the project brought a lawsuit challenging federal voting rights laws, a case in which Justice Thomas filed a lone dissent, embracing the project’s arguments. The project director, an institute fellow named Edward Blum, said the institute supported his research but did not finance the brief filings or the Texas suit, which waslitigated pro bono by a former clerk of Justice Thomas’s.

“When it came time to file a lawsuit,” he said, “A.E.I. had no role in doing that.”

Coming Up With a Plan

In addition to his interest in politics and policy, Mr. Crow is well known for his keen devotion to history.

A backyard garden at his $24 million Dallas residence is dominated by old statues of dictators he has collected from fallen regimes, including Lenin and Stalin. His private library is packed with 8,000 rare books and artifacts, including a Senate roll call sheet from Justice Thomas’s confirmation and a “thank you” letter from the justice, according to local news reports.

There are a number of reasons Justice Thomas might be thankful to Mr. Crow. In addition to giving him the Douglass Bible, valued 10 years ago at $19,000, Mr. Crow has hosted the justice aboard his private jet and his 161-foot yacht, at the exclusive Bohemian Grove retreat in California and at his grand Adirondacks summer estate called Topridge, a 105-acre spread that once belonged to Marjorie Merriweather Post, the cereal heiress.

Christopher Shaw, a folk singer who said he had been invited several times to perform at Topridge, recalled seeing Justice Thomas and his family “on one or two occasions.” They were among about two dozen guests who included other prominent Republicans — last summer, the younger Mr. Bush stopped by.

“There would be guys puffing on cigars,” Mr. Shaw said. “Clarence just kind of melted in with everyone else. We got introduced at dinner. He sat at Harlan’s table.”

Mr. Crow’s $175,000 donation to the library in Savannah in 2001 started out anonymous, but it was eventually made public amid opposition to the project by some local black leaders who did not like Justice Thomas’s politics. Similarly, Mr. Crow sought to keep his role in the museum quiet.

At first glance the Pin Point Heritage Museum, scheduled to open this fall, would seem an unlikely catalyst for an ethical quandary. That Pin Point’s history is worthy of preservation is not in dispute.

Part of the Gullah/Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor designated by Congress, it is representative of tight-knit Southern coastal settlements that trace their roots to freed slaves and were often based around fishing. In Pin Point, the Varn crab and oyster cannery, founded in the 1920s, was a primary source of jobs until it closed in 1985.

Mr. Varn and his wife, Sharon, said they had long hoped the property could be saved from commercial development but had little success coming up with a plan. That changed after their chance encounter with Justice Thomas, who was visiting his childhood home with a television news crew.

Justice Thomas, 62, was born and raised near the cannery overlooking the Moon River, where it was not uncommon for babies to rock in bassinets made of crab baskets while their mothers shucked oysters. He sympathized with the Varns’ wishes and said he had a friend who could help, Mr. Varn said.

The Varns eventually sold their property in April 2008. During a recent interview at their home near the cannery, they made it clear that they were “not supposed to say” who the buyer was, and a news release issued last November by a Savannah public relations firm said the museum was being “privately funded by an anonymous donor.”

But the paper trail leads back to Mr. Crow, and in interviews at the project site, people working on it acknowledged that he was financing it. Property records show a company called HKJRS/Pinpoint bought the land for $1.5 million, and incorporation records say the company is controlled by a Dallas-based partnership run by Mr. Crow.

Project documents reviewed by The Times show a preliminary construction budget of $1.3 million, but it is unclear if that includes expenses related to the content and design of the museum.

Justice Thomas remains closely involved with the project. Emily Owens, a museum spokeswoman who works for Mr. Crow’s company, said the justice “played a big part” in creating a video documentary that will be part of the museum experience. He hosted a design team from Dallas for a four-hour meeting at his Supreme Court offices in February.

And he has had a role in picking people to help with the museum. Barbara Fertig, a history professor at Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, said that she was asked to meet with Justice Thomas last spring and that “by the end of the meeting, he said he would like me to work on this project.”

She said she had “never been particularly curious” about why Mr. Crow is financing it, adding that costly preservation projects are often possible only because of philanthropy motivated by friendships. Justice Thomas and Mr. Crow would seem to fall into that category, Ms. Fertig said.

“I’ve been in the company of the two of them together,” she said, “and they certainly really are friends.”

The Code of Conduct

That friendship is important to determining whether Justice Thomas’s interactions with Mr. Crow conflict with the code, said Raymond J. McKoski, a retired state judge in Illinois who wrote a law review article on charitable fund-raising by judges. If Justice Thomas did not “misuse the prestige of office” in getting Mr. Crow to take on the project, it should not be a concern, he said.

“Some of it depends on the conversations that took place,” Mr. McKoski said. “Who brought up the idea? How willing was Mr. Crow to do it? What exact questions were asked by Justice Thomas?”

Beyond the admonition against fund-raising, the code generally discourages judges from partaking in any off-the-bench behavior that could create even the perception of partiality. It acknowledges the value in judges’ being engaged with their communities, lecturing on the law and doing charitable work, but draws a line where those activities might cause a reasonable person to worry that a judge is indebted to or influenced by someone.

“The code of conduct is quite clear that judges are not supposed to be soliciting money for their pet projects or charities, period,” said Arn Pearson, a lawyer with Common Cause. “If any other federal judge was doing it, he could face disciplinary action.”

The justices are not bound by the federal judiciary’s conduct code, because it is enforced by a committee of judges who rank below the justices. Even so, Justices Breyer and Anthony M. Kennedy said in testimony before Congress in April that the justices followed the code.

Beyond the code, the justices must comply with laws applying to all federal officials that prohibit conflicts of interest and require disclosure of gifts. Justice Thomas’s gift acceptances drew attention in 2004, when The Los Angeles Times reported that he had accumulated gifts totaling $42,200 in the previous six years — far more than any of the other justices.

Since 2004, Justice Thomas has never reported another gift. He has continued to disclose travel costs paid by schools and organizations he has visited for speeches and teaching, but he has not reported that any travel was provided by Mr. Crow.

Travel records for Mr. Crow’s planes and yacht, however, suggest that Justice Thomas may have used them in recent years.

In April 2008, not long after Mr. Crow bought the Pin Point property, one of his private planes flew from Washington to Savannah, where his yacht, the Michaela Rose, was docked.

That same week, an item appeared in a South Carolina lawyers’ publication noting that Justice Thomas was arriving aboard the Michaela Rose in Charleston, a couple of hours north of Savannah, where the Crow family owns luxury vacation properties. The author was a prominent lawyer who said she knew of the visit because of a family connection to Mr. Crow.

Justice Thomas reported no gifts of travel that month in his 2008 disclosure. And there are other instances in which Justice Thomas’s travels correspond to flights taken by Mr. Crow’s planes.

On Jan. 4, 2010, when Justice Thomas was in Savannah for the dedication of a building in his honor, Mr. Crow’s plane flew from Washington to Savannah and returned to Washington the next day. Justice Thomas reported in his financial disclosure that his travel had been paid for by the Savannah College of Art and Design, which owned the building.

In his 2009 financial disclosure, Justice Thomas reported that Southern Methodist University in Dallas — Trammell Crow’s alma mater — had provided his travel for a speech there on Sept. 30. Flight records show that Mr. Crow’s plane flew from Washington to Dallas that day.

Among the questions The Times submitted to Justice Thomas was whether he was on any of those flights, and if so, whether the colleges reimbursed him or Mr. Crow. The colleges declined to comment.

One item not required to be reported in Justice Thomas’s financial disclosures is the millions of dollars Mr. Crow is spending on the museum. That is because the money is not being given to the justice as a gift.

For Algernon and Sharon Varn, who said they were thrilled to see a cherished piece of local history being restored, the museum is a gift to the community. While it is about more than Justice Thomas, they said, he deserves credit for putting them together with someone who had the money and the interest to make the project a reality.

“He was instrumental in getting the process started, because he wanted it preserved to show that no matter where you came from, you can go where you want,” Mr. Varn said. “He had a meager existence, and yet look where he is today. It’s a great American story.”

https://www.salon.com/2017/02/16/gini-thomas-wife-of-supreme-court-justice-clarence-thomas-wants-to-lead-a-pro-trump-grassroots-organization/

Gini Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, wants to lead a pro-Trump grassroots organization

In an email chain, Ginni Thomas said she wanted to start a group that would counter the resistance from the left

By TAYLOR LINK

PUBLISHED FEBRUARY 16, 2017

In an email chain, Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, asked how she could start a grassroots organization that would support President Donald Trump and combat the resistance coalescing against him.

The emails, uncovered by The Daily Beast, were posted to a conservative listerv this month. They revealed an eager Ginni Thomas determined to make sure Trump's policies were enacted.

"What is the best way to, with minimal costs, set up a daily text capacity for a ground-up grassroots army for pro-Trump daily action items to push back agains the left's resistance efforts who are trying to maker America ungovernable?" she wrote.

"There are some grassroots activists, who seem beyond the Republican party or the conservative movement, who wish to join the fray on social media for Trump and link shields and build momentum," she added. "I met with a house load of them yesterday and we want a daily textable tool to start."

Even though judges are not allowed to "personally participate" in raising money for charitable endeavors, Thomas has maintained a friendship with Dallas-based multimillionaire Harlan Crow, who helped finance a museum dedicated to the justice in Pin Point, Georgia. Crow even provided Ginni Thomas $500,000 so that she could start a Tea Party-related group.

Before the Supreme Court heard arguments about the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act in 2011, Ginni Thomas "specifically agitated for the repeal of Obamacare," according to The Nation. Democrats, led by then-Rep. Anthony Weiner, said that Justice Clarence Thomas should recuse himself from the case. He didn't, but it turned out to be a moot point, as the Affordable Care Act's constitutionality was upheld.

:{:{}:

For Clarence Thomas, his wife's current activism could pose a problem.

Heidi Li Feldman, a professor at Georgetown Law School, told The Daily Beast that the email campaign could force Justice Thomas to recuse himself from a case dealing with Trump's executive order on immigration.

"It's pretty egregious," Feldman said of the emails." It's pretty clear that it's quite partisan."

For a Supreme Court justice, it's a personal judgment call whether to opt for recusal because of possible partiality.

Justice Thomas and his wife did not return The Daily Beast's requests for comment.

By TAYLOR LINK

---

ggl 6 22

Friendship of Justice and Magnate Puts Focus on Ethics https://www.nytimes.com › U.S. › Politics

Jun 19, 2011 — Justice Clarence Thomas was given a $15,000 bust of Lincoln in 2001 ... The publicity-shy friend turned out to be Harlan Crow, a Dallas real ...

The Long Crusade of Clarence and Ginni Thomashttps://www.nytimes.com › 2022/02/22 › magazine › clar...

Feb 23, 2022 — The Supreme Court justice and his wife battled for years for a more conservative America. New reporting shows how far she was willing to go ...

Gini Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas ...https://www.salon.com › ... › Taylor Link's Articles

Feb 16, 2017 — In an email chain, Ginni Thomas said she wanted to start a group ... Harlan Crow, who helped finance a museum dedicated to the justice in ...

The Clarence Thomas Scandal - Barbra Streisandhttps://www.barbrastreisand.com › News

Jun 23, 2011 — ... Thomas has a wealthy benefactor named Harlan Crow who has shown lavish generosity to Thomas and his Tea Partying wife Ginni.