Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski, Pro Publica; Justice Clarence Thomas Acknowledges He Should Have Disclosed Free Trips From Billionaire Donor
"Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas acknowledged for the first time in a new financial disclosure filing that he should have publicly reported two free vacations he received from billionaire Harlan Crow...
Legal ethics experts said that Thomas appeared to have violated the law by failing to disclose the trips and gifts."
Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski, ProPublica; Clarence Thomas Acknowledges Undisclosed Real Estate Deal With Harlan Crow and Discloses Private Jet Flights
"Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas for the first time acknowledged that he should have reported selling real estate to billionaire political donor Harlan Crow in 2014, a transaction revealed by ProPublica earlier this year. Writing in his annual financial disclosure form, Thomas said that he “inadvertently failed to realize” that the deal needed to be publicly disclosed...
In a statement Thursday, an attorney for Thomas, Elliot Berke, said that “after reviewing Justice Thomas’s records, I am confident there has been no willful ethics transgression, and any prior reporting errors were strictly inadvertent.”"
Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski, ProPublica; Clarence Thomas Had a Child in Private School. Harlan Crow Paid the Tuition.
"“The most reasonable interpretation of the statute is that this was a gift to Thomas and thus had to be reported. It’s common sense,” said Kathleen Clark, an ethics law expert at Washington University in St. Louis. “It’s all to the financial benefit of Clarence Thomas.”
Martin, now in his 30s, told ProPublica he was not aware that Crow paid his tuition. But he defended Thomas and Crow, saying he believed there was no ulterior motive behind the real estate magnate’s largesse over the decades. “I think his intentions behind everything is just a friend and just a good person,” Martin said.
[After this story was published, Mark Paoletta, a longtime friend of Clarence Thomas who has also served as Ginni Thomas’ lawyer, released a statement. Paoletta confirmed that Crow paid for Martin’s tuition at both Randolph-Macon Academy and Hidden Lake, saying Crow paid for one year at each. He did not give a total amount but, based on the tuition rates at the time, the two years would amount to roughly $100,000.
Paoletta said that Thomas did not have to report the payments because Martin was not his “dependent child” as defined in the disclosure law. He criticized ProPublica for reporting on this and said “the Thomases and the Crows are kind, generous, and loving people who tried to help this young man.”]"
DAHLIA LITHWICK AND MARK JOSEPH STERN, Slate ; Quid Pro Crow
"What mattered last week and what still matters this week is whether the Crow/Thomas dealings can be seen as classic quid pro quo (or perhaps quid pro Crow) corruption."
Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott and Alex Mierjeski, ProPublica; Clarence Thomas and the Billionaire
"For more than two decades, Thomas has accepted luxury trips virtually every year from the Dallas businessman without disclosing them, documents and interviews show. A public servant who has a salary of $285,000, he has vacationed on Crow’s superyacht around the globe. He flies on Crow’s Bombardier Global 5000 jet. He has gone with Crow to the Bohemian Grove, the exclusive California all-male retreat, and to Crow’s sprawling ranch in East Texas. And Thomas typically spends about a week every summer at Crow’s private resort in the Adirondacks.
The extent and frequency of Crow’s apparent gifts to Thomas have no known precedent in the modern history of the U.S. Supreme Court.
These trips appeared nowhere on Thomas’ financial disclosures. His failure to report the flights appears to violate a law passed after Watergate that requires justices, judges, members of Congress and federal officials to disclose most gifts, two ethics law experts said. He also should have disclosed his trips on the yacht, these experts said."
