HARLAN CROW 3

SEE TWO PREVIOUS MAIN THIS 12 23

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CURRENT HARLAN CROW 3

GIBSON DUNN

MIKE ROGERS MICH

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primary 4 23 on pro pub shitstorm

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GIBNEY DOKU2025

FR US NUM 1 LANDLORD?

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7 26 AN

Sketchy GOP megadonor 'maxed out' contributions to John Fetterman

more perf union

We Investigated A Secret Club For Billionaires - More Perfect Union - Democratic Underground Forums

15:06

So I compared our attendee list to McCormick donors.

15:10

11 men in Mandalay camp donated to McCormick's campaign.

15:14

And that's not even including the ones who gave through dark money tricks.

15:18

As Senator McCormick was part of an announcement with President Trump

15:21

for a big push for AI investment in Pennsylvania data centers and power plants.

15:28

at the same event was...

15:31

this guy

15:32

Brendan Bechtel, the latest family CEO and heir to the Bechtel fortune.

15:38

Bechtel is poised to get billions in construction contracts from this deal.

15:44

funneling money and power to Bechtel seems as important

15:46

to the Trump administration as it did to earlier administrations.

15:50

Bechtel is getting big deals with foreign companies for U.S. construction, brokered by Trump.

15:56

They have money tied up in the Venezuelan pipelines Trump wants to seize from the Venezuelan people,

16:01

and they've been floated as a beneficiary of the Kushner/Trump plan to rebuild Gaza.

16:08

We're seeing a level of collusion among the ultra wealthy that seems almost unbeatable.

16:14

They are all on the same team. They are all protecting each other.

16:18

It's not even about party politics, Paul Pelosi, Nancy's husband, is on the list, as is his nephew,

16:25

who works for Harlan Crowe, as are several major centrist and Democratic Party donors.

16:31

They have class solidarity, but so do we.

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.”

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BAK FROM BAK

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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.

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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.

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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."

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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.

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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 ›

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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 GUK on June 23, reporter Stephanie Kirchgaessner emphasizes that the Thomas/Crow controversy is fueling tensions between Crow and Democrats in the U.S. Senate.

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rww 5 23

the revelations about Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas failing to report financial favors given to him and his family by billionaire and Republican mega-donor Harlan Crow just keep coming.

Given how central Thomas has been to the right-wing effort to gain ideological dominance of the federal courts—and use that dominance to return the U.S. to a pre-New Deal constitutional order—it’s not surprising that right-wing legal and political groups have rallied around Thomas.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) is the latest to ignore evidence of Thomas’s repeated lawbreaking and dismiss Pro Publica’s investigative reporting as a “high-tech lynching,” the phrase Thomas used to deflect allegations against him during his confirmation hearing years ago. In fundraising emails this week, Cruz slammed the calls for ethics reform that have spread in response to evidence that Thomas has violated disclosure laws with impunity for many years. Cruz’s emails did not substantively address the apparent repeated violations of disclosure laws by Thomas in ways that hid the scale of financial favors Crow has showered on Thomas and the justice’s right-wing activist wife Ginni; Cruz simply dismissed the well-documented allegations as “baseless.”

Claiming that Thomas is “unable to defend himself from political attacks,” the Cruz email told supporters that there is a way they can help: by sending cash to Cruz’s campaign committee.

Cruz and other Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee are also the beneficiaries of Crow’s largesse. Crow, a founder of the right-wing anti-tax Club for Growth and a board member of the conservative American Enterprise Institute,refused this week to provide the Senate Judiciary Committee with a full list of the gifts and payments he has made to Thomas and his family.

“Clarence Thomas does not belong on the Supreme Court,”People For the American Way President Svante Myrick argued in a recent op ed. People For the American Way has asked its members and activists to sign a petition calling on the Department of Justice to investigate Thomas and hold him accountable.

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BAK FROM MAIN SOME 2X?

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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."

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.

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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.

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an 11 23

"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.

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an 8 23

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:

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.

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

no lnx guk

an 6 23

:{:{}:

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.

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

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 ›