Clarence Thomas discloses more private jet travel paid for by GOP megadonor Harlan Crow - USA Trending Blog
Clarence Thomas discloses more private jet travel paid for by GOP megadonor Harlan Crow - USA Trending Blog
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas on Thursday disclosed additional travel paid for by GOP mega-donor Harlan Crow last year, including a private jet flight to Texas that the justice said he accepted because of increased security after the leak of the high court's controversial abortion opinion.
In an extensive note attached to an annual disclosure report made public Thursday, Thomas noted a flight paid for by Crow last year for an American Enterprise Institute event in Dallas in which the justice was the keynote speaker. Thomas said that he accepted the private flight because of "the increased security risk" after the leak in May of a draft of the high court's opinion overturning Roe v. Wade.
The annual disclosure report, which typically provide only limited details about justices' outside income and investments, also noted a private plane trip paid for by Crow to Texas in February 2022 which Thomas said he accepted because of an "unexpected ice storm." The disclosure notes another trip paid for by Crow to Crow's lodge in the Adirondacks and, for the first time, acknowledged Crow's purchase of property from Thomas in 2014.
The details on the disclosure arrived as the Supreme Court and Thomas in particular have been under intense scrutiny for months over outside gifts and travel a debate that has prompted Democrats in Congress and outside groups to pressure the court to embrace a code of ethics and greater transparency.
In an unusual move perhaps underscoring the attention a series of recent stories in ProPublica detailing luxury travel have received, an attorney for Thomas fired back at critics who have questioned his ethics in a lengthy statement, describing the criticism of the senior most associate justice as "political blood sport."
A report filed by Justice Samuel Alito also was made public Thursday, though his was more perfunctory. Alito disclosed that Notre Dame Law School paid for a trip to Italy last summer in which he used an address in Rome to push back on critics of the Supreme Court's decision to end a constitutional right to abortion.
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