Statement from Harlan Crow
by Harlan Crow
4/13/23
My wife Kathy and I have been friends with Justice Thomas and his wife Ginni since 1996. We are very dear friends. The hospitality we have extended to the Thomas’s over the years is no different from the hospitality we have extended to our many other dear friends. We have been most fortunate to have a great life of many friends and financial success, and we have always placed a priority on spending time with our family and friends. Justice Thomas and Ginni never asked for any of this hospitality.
We have never asked about a pending or lower court case, and Justice Thomas has never discussed one, and we have never sought to influence Justice Thomas on any legal or political issue. More generally, I am unaware of any of our friends ever lobbying or seeking to influence Justice Thomas on any case, and I would never invite anyone who I believe had any intention of doing that. These are gatherings of friends.
On a number of occasions, we have made contributions to projects celebrating the life and legacy of Justice Thomas, just as we have done with other great leaders and historically significant figures. He and Ginni never asked us to do any of this. We did so because we believe Justice Thomas to be one of the greatest Americans of our time, and we believe it is important to make sure as many people as possible learn about him, remember him, and understand the ideals for which he stands. We will continue to support projects that advance this goal.
Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler Art
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
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Billionaire Harlan Crow Bought Property From Clarence Thomas. The Justice Didn’t Disclose the Deal.
by Justin Elliott, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski
PropPublica
April 13, 2:20 p.m. EDT
https://www.propublica.org/article/clar ... ate-scotus
The transaction is the first known instance of money flowing from Crow to the Supreme Court justice. The sale netted the GOP megadonor two vacant lots and the house where Thomas’ mother was living.
In 2014, one of Texas billionaire Harlan Crow’s companies purchased a string of properties on a quiet residential street in Savannah, Georgia. It wasn’t a marquee acquisition for the real estate magnate, just an old single-story home and two vacant lots down the road. What made it noteworthy were the people on the other side of the deal: Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his relatives.
The transaction marks the first known instance of money flowing from the Republican megadonor to the Supreme Court justice. The Crow company bought the properties for $133,363 from three co-owners — Thomas, his mother and the family of Thomas’ late brother, according to a state tax document and a deed dated Oct. 15, 2014, filed at the Chatham County courthouse.
The purchase put Crow in an unusual position: He now owned the house where the justice’s elderly mother was living. Soon after the sale was completed, contractors began work on tens of thousands of dollars of improvements on the two-bedroom, one-bathroom home, which looks out onto a patch of orange trees. The renovations included a carport, a repaired roof and a new fence and gates, according to city permit records and blueprints.
A federal disclosure law passed after Watergate requires justices and other officials to disclose the details of most real estate sales over $1,000. Thomas never disclosed his sale of the Savannah properties. That appears to be a violation of the law, four ethics law experts told ProPublica.
The disclosure form Thomas filed for that year also had a space to report the identity of the buyer in any private transaction, such as a real estate deal. That space is blank.
“He needed to report his interest in the sale,” said Virginia Canter, a former government ethics lawyer now at the watchdog group CREW. “Given the role Crow has played in subsidizing the lifestyle of Thomas and his wife, you have to wonder if this was an effort to put cash in their pockets.”
Thomas did not respond to detailed questions for this story.
In a statement, Crow said he purchased Thomas’ mother’s house, where Thomas spent part of his childhood, to preserve it for posterity. “My intention is to one day create a public museum at the Thomas home dedicated to telling the story of our nation’s second black Supreme Court Justice,” he said. “I approached the Thomas family about my desire to maintain this historic site so future generations could learn about the inspiring life of one of our greatest Americans.”
Crow’s statement did not directly address why he also bought two vacant lots from Thomas down the street. But he wrote that “the other lots were later sold to a vetted builder who was committed to improving the quality of the neighborhood and preserving its historical integrity.”
ProPublica also asked Crow about the additions on Thomas’ mother’s house, like the new carport. “Improvements were also made to the Thomas property to preserve its long-term viability and accessibility to the public,” Crow said.
Ethics law experts said Crow’s intentions had no bearing on Thomas’ legal obligation to disclose the sale.
The justice’s failure to report the transaction suggests “Thomas was hiding a financial relationship with Crow,” said Kathleen Clark, a legal ethics expert at Washington University in St. Louis who reviewed years of Thomas’ disclosure filings.
There are a handful of carve-outs in the disclosure law. For example, if someone sells “property used solely as a personal residence of the reporting individual or the individual’s spouse,” they don’t need to report it. Experts said the exemptions clearly did not apply to Thomas’ sale.
The revelation of a direct financial transaction between Thomas and Crow casts their relationship in a new light. ProPublica reported last week that Thomas has accepted luxury travel from Crow virtually every year for decades, including private jet flights, international cruises on the businessman’s superyacht and regular stays at his private resort in the Adirondacks. Crow has long been influential in conservative politics and has spent millions on efforts to shape the law and the judiciary. The story prompted outcry and calls for investigations from Democratic lawmakers.
In response to that reporting, both Thomas and Crow released statements downplaying the significance of the gifts. Thomas also maintained that he wasn’t required to disclose the trips.
“Harlan and Kathy Crow are among our dearest friends,” Thomas wrote. “As friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips.” Crow told ProPublica that his gifts to Thomas were “no different from the hospitality we have extended to our many other dear friends.”
It’s unclear if Crow paid fair market value for the Thomas properties. Crow also bought several other properties on the street and paid significantly less than his deal with the Thomases. One example: In 2013, he bought a pair of properties on the same block — a vacant lot and a small house — for a total of $40,000.
[x]
The block in Savannah, Georgia, where Texas billionaire Harlan Crow bought property from Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Today, the vacant lots Thomas sold to Crow have been replaced by two-story homes. Credit: Octavio Jones for ProPublica
In his statement, Crow said his company purchased the properties “at market rate based on many factors including the size, quality, and livability of the dwellings.”
He did not respond to requests to provide documentation or details of how he arrived at the price.
Thomas was born in the coastal hamlet of Pin Point, outside Savannah. He later moved to the city, where he spent part of his childhood in his grandfather’s home on East 32nd Street.
“It had hardwood floors, handsome furniture, and an indoor bathroom, and we knew better than to touch anything,” Thomas wrote of the house in his memoir, “My Grandfather’s Son.”
He inherited his stake in that house and two other properties on the block following the death of his grandfather in 1983, according to records on file at the Chatham County courthouse. He shared ownership with his brother and his mother, Leola Williams. In the late 1980s, when Thomas was an official in the George H.W. Bush administration, he listed the addresses of the three properties in a disclosure filing. He reported that he had a one-third interest in them.
Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court in 1991. By the early 2000s, he had stopped listing specific addresses of property he owned in his disclosures. But he continued to report holding a one-third interest in what he described as “rental property at ## 1, 2, & 3” in Savannah. He valued his stake in the properties at $15,000 or less.
Two of the houses were torn down around 2010, according to property records and a footnote in Thomas’ annual disclosure archived by Free Law Project.
In 2014, the Thomas family sold the vacant lots and the remaining East 32nd Street house to one of Crow’s companies. The justice signed the paperwork personally. His signature was notarized by an administrator at the Supreme Court, Perry Thompson, who did not respond to a request for comment. (The deed was signed on the 23rd anniversary of Thomas’ Oct. 15 confirmation to the Supreme Court. Crow has a Senate roll call sheet from the confirmation vote in his private library.)
Thomas’ financial disclosure for that year is detailed, listing everything from a “stained glass medallion” he received from Yale to a life insurance policy. But he failed to report his sale to Crow.
[x]
Thomas’ signature on the deed for his deal with Crow. Credit: Chatham County Superior Court.
[x]
A 2014 photograph shows the vacant lots that Crow bought from Thomas. Credit: Chatham County Metropolitan Planning Commission.
Crow purchased the properties through a recently formed Texas company called Savannah Historic Developments LLC. The company shares an address in Dallas with Crow Holdings, the centerpiece of his real estate empire. Its formation documents were signed by Crow Holdings’ general counsel. Business records filed with the Texas secretary of state say Savannah Historic Developments is managed by a Delaware LLC, HRC Family Branch GP, an umbrella company that also covers other Crow assets like his private jet. The Delaware company’s CEO is Harlan Crow.
A Crow Holdings company soon began paying the roughly $1,500 in annual property taxes on Thomas’ mother’s house, according to county tax records. The taxes had previously been paid by Clarence and Ginni Thomas.
Crow still owns Thomas’ mother’s home, which the now-94-year-old continued to live in through at least 2020, according to public records and social media. Two neighbors told ProPublica she still lives there. Crow did not respond to questions about whether he has charged her rent. Soon after Crow purchased the house, an award-winning local architecture firm received permits to begin $36,000 of improvements.
[x]
Drawings illustrate some of the improvements made to Thomas’ mother’s home after Crow bought it. Credit: Obtained by ProPublica
Crow’s purchases seem to have played a role in transforming the block. The billionaire eventually sold most of the other properties he bought to new owners who built upscale modern homes, including the two vacant lots he purchased from Thomas.
Crow also bought the house immediately next door to Thomas’ mother, which was owned by somebody else and had been known for parties and noise, according to property records and W. John Mitchell, former president of a nearby neighborhood association. Soon the house was torn down. “It was an eyesore,” Mitchell said. “One day miraculously all of them were put out of there and they scraped it off the earth.”
“The surrounding properties had fallen into disrepair and needed to be demolished for health and safety reasons,” Crow said in his statement. He added that his company built one new house on the block “and made it available to a local police officer.”
Today, the block is composed of a dwindling number of longtime elderly homeowners and a growing population of young newcomers. The vacant lots that the Thomas family once owned have been replaced by pristine two-story homes. An artisanal coffee shop and a Mediterranean bistro are within walking distance. Down the street, a multicolored pride flag blows in the wind.
Justin Elliott is a ProPublica reporter covering politics and government accountability. To securely send Justin documents or other files online, visit our SecureDrop page or reach him through one of the methods below.
by Justin Elliott, Joshua Kaplan and Alex Mierjeski
PropPublica
April 13, 2:20 p.m. EDT
https://www.propublica.org/article/clar ... ate-scotus
The transaction is the first known instance of money flowing from Crow to the Supreme Court justice. The sale netted the GOP megadonor two vacant lots and the house where Thomas’ mother was living.
In 2014, one of Texas billionaire Harlan Crow’s companies purchased a string of properties on a quiet residential street in Savannah, Georgia. It wasn’t a marquee acquisition for the real estate magnate, just an old single-story home and two vacant lots down the road. What made it noteworthy were the people on the other side of the deal: Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and his relatives.
The transaction marks the first known instance of money flowing from the Republican megadonor to the Supreme Court justice. The Crow company bought the properties for $133,363 from three co-owners — Thomas, his mother and the family of Thomas’ late brother, according to a state tax document and a deed dated Oct. 15, 2014, filed at the Chatham County courthouse.
The purchase put Crow in an unusual position: He now owned the house where the justice’s elderly mother was living. Soon after the sale was completed, contractors began work on tens of thousands of dollars of improvements on the two-bedroom, one-bathroom home, which looks out onto a patch of orange trees. The renovations included a carport, a repaired roof and a new fence and gates, according to city permit records and blueprints.
A federal disclosure law passed after Watergate requires justices and other officials to disclose the details of most real estate sales over $1,000. Thomas never disclosed his sale of the Savannah properties. That appears to be a violation of the law, four ethics law experts told ProPublica.
The disclosure form Thomas filed for that year also had a space to report the identity of the buyer in any private transaction, such as a real estate deal. That space is blank.
“He needed to report his interest in the sale,” said Virginia Canter, a former government ethics lawyer now at the watchdog group CREW. “Given the role Crow has played in subsidizing the lifestyle of Thomas and his wife, you have to wonder if this was an effort to put cash in their pockets.”
Thomas did not respond to detailed questions for this story.
In a statement, Crow said he purchased Thomas’ mother’s house, where Thomas spent part of his childhood, to preserve it for posterity. “My intention is to one day create a public museum at the Thomas home dedicated to telling the story of our nation’s second black Supreme Court Justice,” he said. “I approached the Thomas family about my desire to maintain this historic site so future generations could learn about the inspiring life of one of our greatest Americans.”
Crow’s statement did not directly address why he also bought two vacant lots from Thomas down the street. But he wrote that “the other lots were later sold to a vetted builder who was committed to improving the quality of the neighborhood and preserving its historical integrity.”
ProPublica also asked Crow about the additions on Thomas’ mother’s house, like the new carport. “Improvements were also made to the Thomas property to preserve its long-term viability and accessibility to the public,” Crow said.
Ethics law experts said Crow’s intentions had no bearing on Thomas’ legal obligation to disclose the sale.
The justice’s failure to report the transaction suggests “Thomas was hiding a financial relationship with Crow,” said Kathleen Clark, a legal ethics expert at Washington University in St. Louis who reviewed years of Thomas’ disclosure filings.
There are a handful of carve-outs in the disclosure law. For example, if someone sells “property used solely as a personal residence of the reporting individual or the individual’s spouse,” they don’t need to report it. Experts said the exemptions clearly did not apply to Thomas’ sale.
The revelation of a direct financial transaction between Thomas and Crow casts their relationship in a new light. ProPublica reported last week that Thomas has accepted luxury travel from Crow virtually every year for decades, including private jet flights, international cruises on the businessman’s superyacht and regular stays at his private resort in the Adirondacks. Crow has long been influential in conservative politics and has spent millions on efforts to shape the law and the judiciary. The story prompted outcry and calls for investigations from Democratic lawmakers.
In response to that reporting, both Thomas and Crow released statements downplaying the significance of the gifts. Thomas also maintained that he wasn’t required to disclose the trips.
“Harlan and Kathy Crow are among our dearest friends,” Thomas wrote. “As friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips.” Crow told ProPublica that his gifts to Thomas were “no different from the hospitality we have extended to our many other dear friends.”
It’s unclear if Crow paid fair market value for the Thomas properties. Crow also bought several other properties on the street and paid significantly less than his deal with the Thomases. One example: In 2013, he bought a pair of properties on the same block — a vacant lot and a small house — for a total of $40,000.
[x]
The block in Savannah, Georgia, where Texas billionaire Harlan Crow bought property from Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Today, the vacant lots Thomas sold to Crow have been replaced by two-story homes. Credit: Octavio Jones for ProPublica
In his statement, Crow said his company purchased the properties “at market rate based on many factors including the size, quality, and livability of the dwellings.”
He did not respond to requests to provide documentation or details of how he arrived at the price.
Thomas was born in the coastal hamlet of Pin Point, outside Savannah. He later moved to the city, where he spent part of his childhood in his grandfather’s home on East 32nd Street.
“It had hardwood floors, handsome furniture, and an indoor bathroom, and we knew better than to touch anything,” Thomas wrote of the house in his memoir, “My Grandfather’s Son.”
He inherited his stake in that house and two other properties on the block following the death of his grandfather in 1983, according to records on file at the Chatham County courthouse. He shared ownership with his brother and his mother, Leola Williams. In the late 1980s, when Thomas was an official in the George H.W. Bush administration, he listed the addresses of the three properties in a disclosure filing. He reported that he had a one-third interest in them.
Thomas was confirmed to the Supreme Court in 1991. By the early 2000s, he had stopped listing specific addresses of property he owned in his disclosures. But he continued to report holding a one-third interest in what he described as “rental property at ## 1, 2, & 3” in Savannah. He valued his stake in the properties at $15,000 or less.
Two of the houses were torn down around 2010, according to property records and a footnote in Thomas’ annual disclosure archived by Free Law Project.
In 2014, the Thomas family sold the vacant lots and the remaining East 32nd Street house to one of Crow’s companies. The justice signed the paperwork personally. His signature was notarized by an administrator at the Supreme Court, Perry Thompson, who did not respond to a request for comment. (The deed was signed on the 23rd anniversary of Thomas’ Oct. 15 confirmation to the Supreme Court. Crow has a Senate roll call sheet from the confirmation vote in his private library.)
Thomas’ financial disclosure for that year is detailed, listing everything from a “stained glass medallion” he received from Yale to a life insurance policy. But he failed to report his sale to Crow.
[x]
Thomas’ signature on the deed for his deal with Crow. Credit: Chatham County Superior Court.
[x]
A 2014 photograph shows the vacant lots that Crow bought from Thomas. Credit: Chatham County Metropolitan Planning Commission.
Crow purchased the properties through a recently formed Texas company called Savannah Historic Developments LLC. The company shares an address in Dallas with Crow Holdings, the centerpiece of his real estate empire. Its formation documents were signed by Crow Holdings’ general counsel. Business records filed with the Texas secretary of state say Savannah Historic Developments is managed by a Delaware LLC, HRC Family Branch GP, an umbrella company that also covers other Crow assets like his private jet. The Delaware company’s CEO is Harlan Crow.
A Crow Holdings company soon began paying the roughly $1,500 in annual property taxes on Thomas’ mother’s house, according to county tax records. The taxes had previously been paid by Clarence and Ginni Thomas.
Crow still owns Thomas’ mother’s home, which the now-94-year-old continued to live in through at least 2020, according to public records and social media. Two neighbors told ProPublica she still lives there. Crow did not respond to questions about whether he has charged her rent. Soon after Crow purchased the house, an award-winning local architecture firm received permits to begin $36,000 of improvements.
[x]
Drawings illustrate some of the improvements made to Thomas’ mother’s home after Crow bought it. Credit: Obtained by ProPublica
Crow’s purchases seem to have played a role in transforming the block. The billionaire eventually sold most of the other properties he bought to new owners who built upscale modern homes, including the two vacant lots he purchased from Thomas.
Crow also bought the house immediately next door to Thomas’ mother, which was owned by somebody else and had been known for parties and noise, according to property records and W. John Mitchell, former president of a nearby neighborhood association. Soon the house was torn down. “It was an eyesore,” Mitchell said. “One day miraculously all of them were put out of there and they scraped it off the earth.”
“The surrounding properties had fallen into disrepair and needed to be demolished for health and safety reasons,” Crow said in his statement. He added that his company built one new house on the block “and made it available to a local police officer.”
Today, the block is composed of a dwindling number of longtime elderly homeowners and a growing population of young newcomers. The vacant lots that the Thomas family once owned have been replaced by pristine two-story homes. An artisanal coffee shop and a Mediterranean bistro are within walking distance. Down the street, a multicolored pride flag blows in the wind.
Justin Elliott is a ProPublica reporter covering politics and government accountability. To securely send Justin documents or other files online, visit our SecureDrop page or reach him through one of the methods below.
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 37523
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Fri Apr 14, 2023 2:41 am
Ginni Thomas pressed 29 Arizona lawmakers to help overturn Trump's defeat, emails show: The wife of Justice Clarence Thomas sent the messages using FreeRoots, an online platform intended to make it easy to send pre-written emails to multiple elected officials.
by Emma Brown
Washington Post
JUNE 10, 2022 — 10:11PM
https://www.startribune.com/ginni-thoma ... medium=web
[x]
Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, arrives to watch Amy Coney Barrett take the Constitutional Oath on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Monday, Oct. 26, 2020. ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE
Virginia "Ginni" Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, pressed 29 Republican state lawmakers in Arizona - 27 more than previously known - to set aside Joe Biden's popular vote victory and "choose" presidential electors, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post.
The Post reported last month that Thomas sent emails to two Arizona House members, in November and December 2020, urging them to help overturn Biden's win by selecting presidential electors - a responsibility that belongs to Arizona voters under state law. Thomas sent the messages using FreeRoots, an online platform intended to make it easy to send pre-written emails to multiple elected officials.
New documents show that Thomas indeed used the platform to reach many lawmakers simultaneously. On Nov. 9, she sent identical emails to 20 members of the Arizona House and seven Arizona state senators. That represents more than half of the Republican members of the state legislature at the time.
The message, just days after media organizations called the race for Biden in Arizona and nationwide, urged lawmakers to "stand strong in the face of political and media pressure" and claimed that the responsibility to choose electors was "yours and yours alone." They had "power to fight back against fraud" and "ensure that a clean slate of Electors is chosen," the email said.
Among the lawmakers who received the email was then-Rep. Anthony Kern, a Stop the Steal supporter who lost his reelection bid in November 2020 and then joined U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, and others as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against Vice President Mike Pence, a last-ditch effort to overturn Biden's victory. Kern was photographed outside the Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6 but has said he did not enter the building, according to local media reports.
Kern did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. He is seeking his party's nomination for a seat in the Arizona state Senate and has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
On Dec. 13, the day before members of the electoral college were slated to cast their votes and seal Biden's victory, Thomas emailed 22 House members and one senator. "Before you choose your state's Electors . . . consider what will happen to the nation we all love if you don't stand up and lead," the email said. It linked to a video of a man urging swing-state lawmakers to "put things right" and "not give in to cowardice."
Speaker of the House Russell "Rusty" Bowers and Rep. Shawnna Bolick, the two recipients previously identified, told The Post in May that the outreach from Thomas had no bearing on their decisions about how to handle claims of election fraud.
But the revelation that Ginni Thomas was directly involved in pressing them to override the popular vote - an act that would have been without precedent in the modern era - intensified questions about whether her husband should recuse himself from cases related to the 2020 presidential election and attempts to subvert it. Ginni Thomas's status as a leading conservative political activist has set her apart from other spouses of Supreme Court justices.
Ginni Thomas did not respond to requests seeking comment for this report. She has long insisted that she and her husband operate in separate professional lanes.
A spokeswoman for the Supreme Court did not respond to questions for Clarence Thomas.
The Post obtained the emails under Arizona's public records law, which - unlike the laws in some other key 2020 swing states - allows the public to access emails, text messages and other written communications to and from state lawmakers.
In March, The Post and CBS News obtained text messages that Ginni Thomas sent in the weeks after the 2020 election to Mark Meadows, then Trump's chief of staff. The messages showed Thomas spreading false claims and urging Meadows to keep fighting for Trump to remain in the White House.
"That conflict of interest just screams at you," said Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who serves on the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, on MSNBC in response to The Post's May report revealing the emails to Bolick and Bowers.
Schiff pointed to Clarence Thomas's decision not to recuse when Trump went to the Supreme Court to try to block the House committee from getting access to his White House records. The high court declined to block the release of those documents. Thomas, siding with Trump, was the only justice to dissent.
"Here you have the wife of a Supreme Court justice," Schiff said, trying to "get Arizona to improperly cast aside the votes of millions. And also, to add to it, her husband on the Supreme Court, writing a dissent in a case arguing against providing records to Congress that might have revealed some of these same e-mails."
After the May article, Mark Paoletta - a longtime ally of the Thomases who, as a member of the George H.W. Bush administration, played a role in the confirmation of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court - confirmed that Ginni Thomas signed the emails, but he sought to minimize her role.
"Ginni signed her name to a pre-written form letter that was signed by thousands of citizens and sent to state legislators across the country," Paoletta wrote on Twitter on May 20. He described Thomas's activities as "a private citizen joining a letter writing campaign" and added, sarcastically, "How disturbing, what a threat!"
The letter-writing campaigns were organized on FreeRoots.com, which advertised itself as a platform to amplify grass-roots advocacy across the political spectrum. A Post review of its archived webpages shows that it was heavily used in late 2020 by groups seeking to overturn the presidential election results.
One of those groups was Every Legal Vote, which organized the campaign to send the message that Ginni Thomas sent on Nov. 9. In those first days after the Nov. 3 election, Every Legal Vote described itself online as a "labor of love by American citizens, in partnership" with the nonprofit United in Purpose, according to webpages preserved by the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine. United in Purpose, which harnesses data to galvanize conservative Christian voters, in recent years hosted luncheons where Thomas presented her Impact Awards to right-wing leaders.
On Dec. 14, 2020, Biden electors in Arizona cast their votes, after the election results were certified by Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, and Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican.
Trump electors met in Arizona that day and signed a document declaring themselves the state's "duly elected and qualified Electors." One of them was Kern, the outgoing state representative.
Kern was among more than a dozen lawmakers who signed on to a letter to Congress that same day calling for the state's electoral votes to go to Trump or "be nullified completely until a full forensic audit can be conducted."
The lawmakers' letter was an exhibit in Kern and Gohmert's lawsuit asking a federal court to rule that Pence had the "exclusive authority and sole discretion" in deciding which electoral votes to count for a given state. The plaintiffs asked the Supreme Court to intervene after the case was dismissed in lower courts. The day after the Jan. 6 insurrection, the court declined in an unsigned order.
by Emma Brown
Washington Post
JUNE 10, 2022 — 10:11PM
https://www.startribune.com/ginni-thoma ... medium=web
[x]
Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, arrives to watch Amy Coney Barrett take the Constitutional Oath on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Monday, Oct. 26, 2020. ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE
Virginia "Ginni" Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, pressed 29 Republican state lawmakers in Arizona - 27 more than previously known - to set aside Joe Biden's popular vote victory and "choose" presidential electors, according to emails obtained by The Washington Post.
The Post reported last month that Thomas sent emails to two Arizona House members, in November and December 2020, urging them to help overturn Biden's win by selecting presidential electors - a responsibility that belongs to Arizona voters under state law. Thomas sent the messages using FreeRoots, an online platform intended to make it easy to send pre-written emails to multiple elected officials.
New documents show that Thomas indeed used the platform to reach many lawmakers simultaneously. On Nov. 9, she sent identical emails to 20 members of the Arizona House and seven Arizona state senators. That represents more than half of the Republican members of the state legislature at the time.
The message, just days after media organizations called the race for Biden in Arizona and nationwide, urged lawmakers to "stand strong in the face of political and media pressure" and claimed that the responsibility to choose electors was "yours and yours alone." They had "power to fight back against fraud" and "ensure that a clean slate of Electors is chosen," the email said.
Among the lawmakers who received the email was then-Rep. Anthony Kern, a Stop the Steal supporter who lost his reelection bid in November 2020 and then joined U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, and others as a plaintiff in a lawsuit against Vice President Mike Pence, a last-ditch effort to overturn Biden's victory. Kern was photographed outside the Capitol during the riot on Jan. 6 but has said he did not enter the building, according to local media reports.
Kern did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. He is seeking his party's nomination for a seat in the Arizona state Senate and has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump.
On Dec. 13, the day before members of the electoral college were slated to cast their votes and seal Biden's victory, Thomas emailed 22 House members and one senator. "Before you choose your state's Electors . . . consider what will happen to the nation we all love if you don't stand up and lead," the email said. It linked to a video of a man urging swing-state lawmakers to "put things right" and "not give in to cowardice."
Speaker of the House Russell "Rusty" Bowers and Rep. Shawnna Bolick, the two recipients previously identified, told The Post in May that the outreach from Thomas had no bearing on their decisions about how to handle claims of election fraud.
But the revelation that Ginni Thomas was directly involved in pressing them to override the popular vote - an act that would have been without precedent in the modern era - intensified questions about whether her husband should recuse himself from cases related to the 2020 presidential election and attempts to subvert it. Ginni Thomas's status as a leading conservative political activist has set her apart from other spouses of Supreme Court justices.
Ginni Thomas did not respond to requests seeking comment for this report. She has long insisted that she and her husband operate in separate professional lanes.
A spokeswoman for the Supreme Court did not respond to questions for Clarence Thomas.
The Post obtained the emails under Arizona's public records law, which - unlike the laws in some other key 2020 swing states - allows the public to access emails, text messages and other written communications to and from state lawmakers.
In March, The Post and CBS News obtained text messages that Ginni Thomas sent in the weeks after the 2020 election to Mark Meadows, then Trump's chief of staff. The messages showed Thomas spreading false claims and urging Meadows to keep fighting for Trump to remain in the White House.
"That conflict of interest just screams at you," said Adam Schiff, D-Calif., who serves on the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, on MSNBC in response to The Post's May report revealing the emails to Bolick and Bowers.
Schiff pointed to Clarence Thomas's decision not to recuse when Trump went to the Supreme Court to try to block the House committee from getting access to his White House records. The high court declined to block the release of those documents. Thomas, siding with Trump, was the only justice to dissent.
"Here you have the wife of a Supreme Court justice," Schiff said, trying to "get Arizona to improperly cast aside the votes of millions. And also, to add to it, her husband on the Supreme Court, writing a dissent in a case arguing against providing records to Congress that might have revealed some of these same e-mails."
After the May article, Mark Paoletta - a longtime ally of the Thomases who, as a member of the George H.W. Bush administration, played a role in the confirmation of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court - confirmed that Ginni Thomas signed the emails, but he sought to minimize her role.
"Ginni signed her name to a pre-written form letter that was signed by thousands of citizens and sent to state legislators across the country," Paoletta wrote on Twitter on May 20. He described Thomas's activities as "a private citizen joining a letter writing campaign" and added, sarcastically, "How disturbing, what a threat!"
The letter-writing campaigns were organized on FreeRoots.com, which advertised itself as a platform to amplify grass-roots advocacy across the political spectrum. A Post review of its archived webpages shows that it was heavily used in late 2020 by groups seeking to overturn the presidential election results.
One of those groups was Every Legal Vote, which organized the campaign to send the message that Ginni Thomas sent on Nov. 9. In those first days after the Nov. 3 election, Every Legal Vote described itself online as a "labor of love by American citizens, in partnership" with the nonprofit United in Purpose, according to webpages preserved by the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine. United in Purpose, which harnesses data to galvanize conservative Christian voters, in recent years hosted luncheons where Thomas presented her Impact Awards to right-wing leaders.
On Dec. 14, 2020, Biden electors in Arizona cast their votes, after the election results were certified by Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, and Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican.
Trump electors met in Arizona that day and signed a document declaring themselves the state's "duly elected and qualified Electors." One of them was Kern, the outgoing state representative.
Kern was among more than a dozen lawmakers who signed on to a letter to Congress that same day calling for the state's electoral votes to go to Trump or "be nullified completely until a full forensic audit can be conducted."
The lawmakers' letter was an exhibit in Kern and Gohmert's lawsuit asking a federal court to rule that Pence had the "exclusive authority and sole discretion" in deciding which electoral votes to count for a given state. The plaintiffs asked the Supreme Court to intervene after the case was dismissed in lower courts. The day after the Jan. 6 insurrection, the court declined in an unsigned order.
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Tue May 02, 2023 1:54 am
Whistleblower reveals MASSIVE SCANDAL of Chief Supreme Court Justice
by Michael Popok
MeidasTouch
May 1, 2023 Legal AF Podcast - Full Episodes
Michael Popok of Legal AF reports on the brewing ethical scandals on the US Supreme Court embroiling right wing Justices Gorsuch, Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, and Roberts, as the Chief Justice thumbs his nose at the Senate Judiciary and issues a watered down “ethical statement “ that most of them have already violated.
Transcript
This is Michael Popok legal AF it's time to dive in to the right wing of the U.S. Supreme Court and determine whether through transparency we have an ethical corruption problem on the court primarily by the right wing or are they just playing by the old rules that everybody played by and there's nothing to see here I think it's the former I think we have an ethical problem that light has now been shined on since the Clarence Thomas Revelations but now in broil at least five of the others on the right wing of the Court let's start with Clarence Thomas and how we got here the revelations that Clarence Thomas and his wife have accepted millions of dollars of free luxurious vacations around the world on the back of a person on the right wing who has regular business before the court and that's the key every time I'm talking about something during this hot take I'm going to talk about the fact that it links to an entity a lawyer a professor a party who has regular business before the court and that's the problem and that's the ethical corruption issue so with Clarence Thomas Harlan Crowe Real Estate Mogul far right wing entertains Jenny and Clarence Thomas on yachts jumbo Jets and at Resorts of his around the world has been doing it for over a dozen years and that's not all he also took off of Clarence Thomas's hands his family Homestead and the hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars in that transaction as if Harlan Crowe couldn't buy any other house but the one that belongs to Clarence Thomas Harlan Crowe and the entities that he uh has either founded or provided fundraising dollars to in the tens of millions of dollars have regular business in front of the court and Thomas does not recuse himself or disqualify himself from listening to these hearings and that is the problem then you turn to Chief Justice Roberts chief justice Roberts has a wife that has her own career that's nothing wrong with that and in the last five years she's averaged about two million dollars a year working for a major legal recruiter headhunting firm that places lawyers and groups of lawyers at law firms the problem is many of the lawyers and groups that she has placed are at law firms who regularly have business in front of the U.S Supreme Court regularly and there's a reason she is placing obviously these people at these certain firms because it's a gateway to her husband right so we have that then we have Neil Gorsuch, Neil Gorsuch who's also on the right wing he has a cabin in the woods that nobody apparently wants except he sells it to the head of Greenberg Traurig a major Farm based in Miami that regularly conducts business in front of the court and again Gorsuch does not recuse himself but he had no problem with a million dollar transaction with the head of Greenberg trial rig of all the cabins in the remote part of Colorado the Greenberg guy how to buy the one belonging to the one of the Supreme Court justices in in which his firm regularly appears come on and then you have Alito who's got his own ethical dilemmas because it was revealed by Reverend Rob shank several months ago that Alito regularly attended dinners with the founder of Hobby Lobby the right-wing fundamentalist Christian conservative entity and at a dinner in 2014 he talked about a decision he was writing Alito that was against contraception rights and chose religious qualities above the right of a woman to choose and that was in 2014 and that was revealed according to Reverend shank at a dinner hosted by a hosted by The Hobby Lobby people attended by Alito and then you've got Kavanaugh and Gorsuch and Thomas the new reporting for the New York Times today is who are regularly showered with gifts and other luxury items and other perks by being visiting faculty at George Mason University's Scalia law school named after the right wing former Justice who died Antonin Scalia but they are whined and dine Kavanaugh, Gorsuch and Thomas regularly they are even sent to far away places and they're allowed to choose the Exotic locales that they want to teach courses in in Italy in Iceland in in London and it's all expenses paid for them and their families and then there's faculty members at George Mason who regularly at that law school Scalia law school who regularly submit Friend of the Court briefs we call him amicus briefs amicus briefs to do business in front of the court in which their co-professor the Supreme Court justice was just their buddy for the summer so 25 of the amicus briefs that are submitted by Scalia law professors are from people who worked side by side co-teaching classes with Gorsuch ,Kavanaugh and Thomas I I mean again business before the court if you're doing business before the court you would think that the justices would stay away from entanglements and appearances of impropriety that make it appear like their current they're being favors be encurried with them to change a result I mean Scalia University Scalia law school who nobody ever heard of 30 years ago 25 years ago and was founded just in the 20 2015s or so has rocketed up the charts from almost uh 50 top 50 ranking to now it's pushing top 30 ranking and they want to have this close relationship with the right-wing justices now look other justices for the Supreme Court have also guest lectured at Scalia law school um Kagan has done it Sotomayor has done it the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg who was very close to Scalia has also but this incestuous closeness between the far right wing of the court and Scalia law particularly which is basically run by the Federalist Society by Leonard Leo formerly a federalist Society executive who donated 30 million dollars in honor of Anthony Scalia the Koch family who donated uh 10 million dollars to the school and then a 1.6 billion with a B billion dollar donation that was made to uh Leonard Leo's Foundation by a little-known uh electronics Mogul in the midwest who used to own a company called trip light t-r-i-p-p-l-i-t-e and who donated 100 of the shares of trip light to a Leonard Leo for him to go out and do all of his uh campaigning against woke principles critical race Theory and then try to reshape the Judiciary spending now UPS upwards of two billion dollars in order to accomplish that task and what are the funnels for the money is the Scalia Law Center at George Mason with these three law uh Supreme Court Justices sitting there with again business being being performed in front of them well why isn't this a violation of Ethics rules you might be asking because the Supreme Court since time immemorial is not subject and has refused to be subject to the canons of judicial ethics that apply to every other federal and state judge every federal and state judge in America is subject to the Cannons of judicial conducted ethics except the U.S Supreme Court they claim well we're just a co-equal branch of government we have our own article in the U.S Constitution and it wouldn't be right for Congress to pass any type of Regulation against us um we'll do it ourselves we'll self-police but how's that going I just outlined at least four or five potential corruption scandals that were all discovered by investigative journalism and and whistleblowers how's that going Justice Roberts and if we're all looking at Justice Roberts he just gave the middle finger and thumbed his nose at the Senate Judiciary Committee led by Dick Durbin who asked for him to come in to talk about why aren't you imposing an ethical set of cannons an ethical Canon on your court you have a court that's running rampant at least to the public perception rampantly unethical and what are you doing about it come talk to us about it and instead of Chief Justice Roberts took the time to respond by telling Durbin we're not I'm not doing that there's only been two other Chief justices that have come before the senate or the house and it was under very different circumstances and I'm not coming before you because of separation of powers but don't worry we're very ethical because we have just signed on all nine justices to a letter which I'm attaching Senator Durbin that you can read and I'm going to read you parts of this and that letter is a statement on ethics professionalism and practices that the U.S. Supreme Court Justices claim that they follow well you've just heard me in this hot take run through all of the areas where people who have business in front of the court have openly tried to Lobby solicit and curry favor with individual Supreme Court justices in various ways paying Headhunter fees and revenue to a wife of a Supreme Court Justice buying real estate and property from taking it off the hands of a Supreme Court Justice where nobody else apparently wanted it um lavishing them with gifts helping them in Gorsuch's case helping him find housing when he moved to Washington when he became a Supreme Court Justice sending clerks for low cost or almost no cost off of the Scalia law school for instance go work for Gorsuch to show how close an incestuous that relationship is traveling and vacationing all expenses paid on luxurious on luxurious trips for years with somebody who is a right-wing Federalist trying to reshape the court and change policy at the court we've talked about all that so how does uh Roberts handle that well here's you be the judge of it here is I'm going to read for you now from his letter which he claims Justice Roberts claims solves the problem right solves for the equation here's what he says the justices like other federal judges consult a wide variety of Authorities on specific ethical issues they may turn to judicial opinions and treatises and scholarly articles and the historical practice of the court and they may take advice from the Court's legal office and from their colleagues in the note note that the Grabber here he doesn't say they do he says they can he doesn't say in any of the circumstances I just outlined that they're going to he then said that the in 1922 Congress instituted the judicial Conference of the United States to manage the lower federal courts and it binds the lower courts below the Supreme Court nevertheless the conference has contributed to the development of a body of ethical rules and practices which are of significant importance to the justices oh isn't that nice so you know that your brethren below are being ethically managed by Congress and you think that's adorable that's a significant importance to you but you don't say how you how you use it in your daily life how you live the gospel in your daily life um and so it goes on uh it says that the canons of Ethics that are applicable not to the Supreme Court justice but other justices are broadly worded principles that inform ethical practice but they are not themselves rules they are far too General to be used in that manner still the canons as a whole give guidance to the federal Judiciary okay now let's keep going they also went on that the like the lower court judges justices at the Supreme Court in engage in extrajudicial activities which include speaking writing lecturing on both Law related and non-legal subjects the law cannons the court cannons encourage public engagement by judicial officers to avoid isolation Okay now it goes on to say that a Justice of the Supreme Court should consider whether doing any of these things working for a law firm working for a law school vacationing with right-wing people having regular dinner meetings with people on the far right selling property to them and and earning a profit in return they should consider whether any of these things would be considered by an unbiased and reasonable person to be improper an appearance of impropriety okay I'm reasonable I'm unbiased I think it's all shows that an appearance of impropriety the way we've described it especially here on the hot Take and then goes on to say that no such appearance will be created when a justice speaks before a group educational institution a bar group or a not-for-profit that does not regularly does not regularly Lobby or Advocate issues that may be implicated in cases that come before the court I've just described to you at least six examples that are obviously Justice Roberts has buried his head in the sand it doesn't want to acknowledge in which entities and people who regularly have business in front of the court are getting into bed with members of the job of the Supreme Court in various ways financial entanglements and otherwise to Lobby them and if they don't realize that they're being lobbied if they don't realize that their that favor is being curried by spending hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars towards them then their judgment is seriously in doubt and they should be they should be removed from the they should be impeached and removed from the U.S. Supreme Court so that's where we are right now we've got multiple examples and they're almost always on the right it's not because I've edited out on this hot take I don't want to tell you about examples where Sonia Sotomayor or Breyer when he was on the court or or um or a Kagan or Katanji Brown Jackson or any of them did something bad that's similar we don't have this kind of equivalency there's no symmetry it's asymmetrical the right wing do things until they are told they can't and they have as their protector chief justice Roberts who Do's never seen an ethical conflict that he hasn't explained away with a wave of his hand and a paragraph in a self-serving letter patronizing letter sent back to the Senate Judiciary Committee that's where we are we'll follow all of these stories whether it involves Thomas Gorsuch Alito, Cavanaugh, Roberts on hot takes just like this one that I do on the Midas touch Network and I assure you that if one of the other justices from the more moderate wing the Katanji brown Jacksons the Elena Kagans the Sonia Sotomayors if it if it's discovered that they did something wrong I'll be right back here in a hot day and I'll tell you all about it but I got nothing to say as of right now.
by Michael Popok
MeidasTouch
May 1, 2023 Legal AF Podcast - Full Episodes
Michael Popok of Legal AF reports on the brewing ethical scandals on the US Supreme Court embroiling right wing Justices Gorsuch, Thomas, Alito, Kavanaugh, and Roberts, as the Chief Justice thumbs his nose at the Senate Judiciary and issues a watered down “ethical statement “ that most of them have already violated.
Transcript
This is Michael Popok legal AF it's time to dive in to the right wing of the U.S. Supreme Court and determine whether through transparency we have an ethical corruption problem on the court primarily by the right wing or are they just playing by the old rules that everybody played by and there's nothing to see here I think it's the former I think we have an ethical problem that light has now been shined on since the Clarence Thomas Revelations but now in broil at least five of the others on the right wing of the Court let's start with Clarence Thomas and how we got here the revelations that Clarence Thomas and his wife have accepted millions of dollars of free luxurious vacations around the world on the back of a person on the right wing who has regular business before the court and that's the key every time I'm talking about something during this hot take I'm going to talk about the fact that it links to an entity a lawyer a professor a party who has regular business before the court and that's the problem and that's the ethical corruption issue so with Clarence Thomas Harlan Crowe Real Estate Mogul far right wing entertains Jenny and Clarence Thomas on yachts jumbo Jets and at Resorts of his around the world has been doing it for over a dozen years and that's not all he also took off of Clarence Thomas's hands his family Homestead and the hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars in that transaction as if Harlan Crowe couldn't buy any other house but the one that belongs to Clarence Thomas Harlan Crowe and the entities that he uh has either founded or provided fundraising dollars to in the tens of millions of dollars have regular business in front of the court and Thomas does not recuse himself or disqualify himself from listening to these hearings and that is the problem then you turn to Chief Justice Roberts chief justice Roberts has a wife that has her own career that's nothing wrong with that and in the last five years she's averaged about two million dollars a year working for a major legal recruiter headhunting firm that places lawyers and groups of lawyers at law firms the problem is many of the lawyers and groups that she has placed are at law firms who regularly have business in front of the U.S Supreme Court regularly and there's a reason she is placing obviously these people at these certain firms because it's a gateway to her husband right so we have that then we have Neil Gorsuch, Neil Gorsuch who's also on the right wing he has a cabin in the woods that nobody apparently wants except he sells it to the head of Greenberg Traurig a major Farm based in Miami that regularly conducts business in front of the court and again Gorsuch does not recuse himself but he had no problem with a million dollar transaction with the head of Greenberg trial rig of all the cabins in the remote part of Colorado the Greenberg guy how to buy the one belonging to the one of the Supreme Court justices in in which his firm regularly appears come on and then you have Alito who's got his own ethical dilemmas because it was revealed by Reverend Rob shank several months ago that Alito regularly attended dinners with the founder of Hobby Lobby the right-wing fundamentalist Christian conservative entity and at a dinner in 2014 he talked about a decision he was writing Alito that was against contraception rights and chose religious qualities above the right of a woman to choose and that was in 2014 and that was revealed according to Reverend shank at a dinner hosted by a hosted by The Hobby Lobby people attended by Alito and then you've got Kavanaugh and Gorsuch and Thomas the new reporting for the New York Times today is who are regularly showered with gifts and other luxury items and other perks by being visiting faculty at George Mason University's Scalia law school named after the right wing former Justice who died Antonin Scalia but they are whined and dine Kavanaugh, Gorsuch and Thomas regularly they are even sent to far away places and they're allowed to choose the Exotic locales that they want to teach courses in in Italy in Iceland in in London and it's all expenses paid for them and their families and then there's faculty members at George Mason who regularly at that law school Scalia law school who regularly submit Friend of the Court briefs we call him amicus briefs amicus briefs to do business in front of the court in which their co-professor the Supreme Court justice was just their buddy for the summer so 25 of the amicus briefs that are submitted by Scalia law professors are from people who worked side by side co-teaching classes with Gorsuch ,Kavanaugh and Thomas I I mean again business before the court if you're doing business before the court you would think that the justices would stay away from entanglements and appearances of impropriety that make it appear like their current they're being favors be encurried with them to change a result I mean Scalia University Scalia law school who nobody ever heard of 30 years ago 25 years ago and was founded just in the 20 2015s or so has rocketed up the charts from almost uh 50 top 50 ranking to now it's pushing top 30 ranking and they want to have this close relationship with the right-wing justices now look other justices for the Supreme Court have also guest lectured at Scalia law school um Kagan has done it Sotomayor has done it the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg who was very close to Scalia has also but this incestuous closeness between the far right wing of the court and Scalia law particularly which is basically run by the Federalist Society by Leonard Leo formerly a federalist Society executive who donated 30 million dollars in honor of Anthony Scalia the Koch family who donated uh 10 million dollars to the school and then a 1.6 billion with a B billion dollar donation that was made to uh Leonard Leo's Foundation by a little-known uh electronics Mogul in the midwest who used to own a company called trip light t-r-i-p-p-l-i-t-e and who donated 100 of the shares of trip light to a Leonard Leo for him to go out and do all of his uh campaigning against woke principles critical race Theory and then try to reshape the Judiciary spending now UPS upwards of two billion dollars in order to accomplish that task and what are the funnels for the money is the Scalia Law Center at George Mason with these three law uh Supreme Court Justices sitting there with again business being being performed in front of them well why isn't this a violation of Ethics rules you might be asking because the Supreme Court since time immemorial is not subject and has refused to be subject to the canons of judicial ethics that apply to every other federal and state judge every federal and state judge in America is subject to the Cannons of judicial conducted ethics except the U.S Supreme Court they claim well we're just a co-equal branch of government we have our own article in the U.S Constitution and it wouldn't be right for Congress to pass any type of Regulation against us um we'll do it ourselves we'll self-police but how's that going I just outlined at least four or five potential corruption scandals that were all discovered by investigative journalism and and whistleblowers how's that going Justice Roberts and if we're all looking at Justice Roberts he just gave the middle finger and thumbed his nose at the Senate Judiciary Committee led by Dick Durbin who asked for him to come in to talk about why aren't you imposing an ethical set of cannons an ethical Canon on your court you have a court that's running rampant at least to the public perception rampantly unethical and what are you doing about it come talk to us about it and instead of Chief Justice Roberts took the time to respond by telling Durbin we're not I'm not doing that there's only been two other Chief justices that have come before the senate or the house and it was under very different circumstances and I'm not coming before you because of separation of powers but don't worry we're very ethical because we have just signed on all nine justices to a letter which I'm attaching Senator Durbin that you can read and I'm going to read you parts of this and that letter is a statement on ethics professionalism and practices that the U.S. Supreme Court Justices claim that they follow well you've just heard me in this hot take run through all of the areas where people who have business in front of the court have openly tried to Lobby solicit and curry favor with individual Supreme Court justices in various ways paying Headhunter fees and revenue to a wife of a Supreme Court Justice buying real estate and property from taking it off the hands of a Supreme Court Justice where nobody else apparently wanted it um lavishing them with gifts helping them in Gorsuch's case helping him find housing when he moved to Washington when he became a Supreme Court Justice sending clerks for low cost or almost no cost off of the Scalia law school for instance go work for Gorsuch to show how close an incestuous that relationship is traveling and vacationing all expenses paid on luxurious on luxurious trips for years with somebody who is a right-wing Federalist trying to reshape the court and change policy at the court we've talked about all that so how does uh Roberts handle that well here's you be the judge of it here is I'm going to read for you now from his letter which he claims Justice Roberts claims solves the problem right solves for the equation here's what he says the justices like other federal judges consult a wide variety of Authorities on specific ethical issues they may turn to judicial opinions and treatises and scholarly articles and the historical practice of the court and they may take advice from the Court's legal office and from their colleagues in the note note that the Grabber here he doesn't say they do he says they can he doesn't say in any of the circumstances I just outlined that they're going to he then said that the in 1922 Congress instituted the judicial Conference of the United States to manage the lower federal courts and it binds the lower courts below the Supreme Court nevertheless the conference has contributed to the development of a body of ethical rules and practices which are of significant importance to the justices oh isn't that nice so you know that your brethren below are being ethically managed by Congress and you think that's adorable that's a significant importance to you but you don't say how you how you use it in your daily life how you live the gospel in your daily life um and so it goes on uh it says that the canons of Ethics that are applicable not to the Supreme Court justice but other justices are broadly worded principles that inform ethical practice but they are not themselves rules they are far too General to be used in that manner still the canons as a whole give guidance to the federal Judiciary okay now let's keep going they also went on that the like the lower court judges justices at the Supreme Court in engage in extrajudicial activities which include speaking writing lecturing on both Law related and non-legal subjects the law cannons the court cannons encourage public engagement by judicial officers to avoid isolation Okay now it goes on to say that a Justice of the Supreme Court should consider whether doing any of these things working for a law firm working for a law school vacationing with right-wing people having regular dinner meetings with people on the far right selling property to them and and earning a profit in return they should consider whether any of these things would be considered by an unbiased and reasonable person to be improper an appearance of impropriety okay I'm reasonable I'm unbiased I think it's all shows that an appearance of impropriety the way we've described it especially here on the hot Take and then goes on to say that no such appearance will be created when a justice speaks before a group educational institution a bar group or a not-for-profit that does not regularly does not regularly Lobby or Advocate issues that may be implicated in cases that come before the court I've just described to you at least six examples that are obviously Justice Roberts has buried his head in the sand it doesn't want to acknowledge in which entities and people who regularly have business in front of the court are getting into bed with members of the job of the Supreme Court in various ways financial entanglements and otherwise to Lobby them and if they don't realize that they're being lobbied if they don't realize that their that favor is being curried by spending hundreds of thousands and millions of dollars towards them then their judgment is seriously in doubt and they should be they should be removed from the they should be impeached and removed from the U.S. Supreme Court so that's where we are right now we've got multiple examples and they're almost always on the right it's not because I've edited out on this hot take I don't want to tell you about examples where Sonia Sotomayor or Breyer when he was on the court or or um or a Kagan or Katanji Brown Jackson or any of them did something bad that's similar we don't have this kind of equivalency there's no symmetry it's asymmetrical the right wing do things until they are told they can't and they have as their protector chief justice Roberts who Do's never seen an ethical conflict that he hasn't explained away with a wave of his hand and a paragraph in a self-serving letter patronizing letter sent back to the Senate Judiciary Committee that's where we are we'll follow all of these stories whether it involves Thomas Gorsuch Alito, Cavanaugh, Roberts on hot takes just like this one that I do on the Midas touch Network and I assure you that if one of the other justices from the more moderate wing the Katanji brown Jacksons the Elena Kagans the Sonia Sotomayors if it if it's discovered that they did something wrong I'll be right back here in a hot day and I'll tell you all about it but I got nothing to say as of right now.
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Tue May 16, 2023 1:37 am
Republican billionaire & Clarence Thomas's bestie Harlan Crow says he WON'T provide info to Senate
by Glenn Kirschner
May 14, 2023 #TeamJustice
ProPublica recently revealed that Republican billionaire Harlan Crow lavished extravagant trips and accommodations on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Then it was revealed that Crow also bought Thomas's mother's house and let her live there rent free. But wait, there's more - Crow reportedly payed private school tuition for a grandnephew Thomas was raising as a son.
Not surprisingly, the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Finance Committee demanded Crow provide information about the lavish gifts, benefits and payments to Thomas and his family, in an effort to investigate what kind of legislative fixes need to be enacted to address what appears to be rampant influence peddling and purchasing.
Crow just told the Senate Finance Committee that he will NOT be providing the requested evidence. And wait until you hear the reasons Crow gave for why he was refusing to cooperate with the Senate.
Transcript
so friends a republican billionaire Mega
donor who has been lavishing extravagant
expensive gifts and benefits on Supreme
Court Justice Clarence Thomas just told
the senate committee
no I won't be providing you information
about any of that
about what is essentially his Supreme
Court influence operation
let's talk about that
because Justice matters
[Music]
[Music]
hey all Glenn kirschner here
so friends recent reporting by
propublica revealed that Republican
billionaire megadon or Harlan Crow has
for a very long time been lavishing
millions of dollars worth of luxury
trips and accommodations on Supreme
Court Justice Clarence Thomas
Crowe also reportedly purchased Thomas's
mother's home dumped all kinds of money
into it to make improvements and then of
course let Thomas's mother live there
rent free Crow reportedly paid the
private school tuition of Clarence
Thomas's I believe Grand nephew who he
raises as a son
etc
etc
etc so not surprisingly
Senate committees have requested
information and accounting from crow
about how much money he has dumped into
Clarence Thomas and his family members
in what is a pretty transparent
influence peddling operation
are you ready for Harlan Crow's reply
headline from NBC News Harlan crowed
declines to provide Senate finance
committee with list of gifts he has
given to Justice Clarence Thomas
because of course he declined
the article begins Republican donor
Harlan Crowe wrote in a letter to the
Senate finance committee that he will
not provide a list of gifts he gave to
Justice Clarence Thomas who has faced
recent calls to step down
to resign
to leave the Supreme Court because you
have disgraced this nation
those are my editorial Editions
the article continues
Crow conveyed that decision to committee
chairman Senator Ron Wyden which a
representative for Crow provided to NBC
News
Wyden spokesperson Ryan Carey also
confirmed to NBC that the committee had
received Crowe's letter
friends here's what Crow said
quote we have serious concerns about the
scope of and Authority for this inquiry
as you are aware the committee's powers
to investigate are not unlimited the
letter from Crow's lawyer Michael Bopp
said
the Senate finance committee Bop argued
lacks a legislative purpose in its
request for the list of gifts saying
that the Supreme Court has explicitly
stated that Congress has no authority to
engage in law enforcement investigations
or to conduct investigations aimed at
exposing citizens Private Affairs for
the sake of exposure
the committee also lacks the authority
to conduct a tax audit Bop wrote for the
purpose of determining whether Justice
Thomas complied with ethical standards
the chairman believes should apply in
this instance
in addition Bob said that the panel's
inquiry targeting a Supreme Court
Justice raises substantial separation of
powers concerns
the letter argues that the crows whom
Bob said have been friends with the
Thomases for more than 20 years have
provided Hospitality to the justice and
his family
the IRS Bob wrote has not been
aggressive in arguing a gift tax law
applies in that context
he also said that the sale of properties
related to Thomas which the judge didn't
disclose
complied with federal and state gift tax
laws
wow just
wow
so let's take Harlan Crowe and his
lawyer Mr Bops assertions one at a time
first of all
we have serious concerns about the scope
of and Authority for this inquiry as you
are aware the committee's powers to
investigate are not unlimited I'm quite
sure the committee is aware of its own
powers and the limits thereof
the Senate finance committee lacks a
legislative purpose in its request for
the list of gifts well let's see
maybe Congress should legislate more
robust and farther reaching Financial
disclosure requirements on Supreme Court
Justices and maybe they should legislate
and increase the penalties for knowing
obvious intentional transparent
violations of those financial disclosure
requirements maybe those penalties
should include significant periods of
incarceration if you violate the law and
you abuse the public trust and you
denigrate the legitimacy of the Supreme
Court
as Clarence Thomas has done frankly this
is a legislative purpose Palooza
let's take on Mr Bops next complaint
the committee also lacks the authority
to conduct a tax audit for the purpose
of determining whether Justice Thomas
complied with ethical standards the
chairman believes should apply in this
instance
so what now Harlan Crowe and his
attorney Mr bopper are also representing
the interests of Clarence Thomas they're
defending him they're suggesting he did
nothing wrong don't look at his tax
returns
whatever you do
don't check to see if Clarence Thomas
fully and accurately and truthfully
reported all of the income all of the
benefits the in-kind donations the
tuition payments that he should have
reported no need to pull back that
curtain
but Mr Bop goes on
Bob said that the panel's inquiry
targeting a Supreme Court Justice raises
substantial separation of powers
concerns
wow so now
Harlan Crowe is raising the Grievances
of a co-equal branch of government the
Judiciary the judicial branch Harlan
Crowe believes I guess he gets to assert
that Congress the legislative branches
overstepping its its bounds separation
of powers you have no right to interfere
in the judicial branches business now
what is it that gives Harlan Crowe
standing to assert the the rights and
grievances of the judicial branch of
government
I mean maybe he does feel like a
dues-paying member right with all of the
money and benefits he's lavished on a
Supreme Court Justice maybe he feels
like he's an honorary member of the
Supreme Court right I mean goodness
knows he's paid enough to have influence
there but still he doesn't get to assert
a separation of powers concern that's
really not for him to decide when a
senate committee is seeking information
you know that's generally something we
leave up to the courts
uh Harlan
all right let's just do one more
Bob says that Harlan Crowe has been
friends with the Thomases for more than
20 years Harlan Crowe has provided
Hospitality to the justice and his
family friends has anybody ever provided
you Hospitality that included buying
your mother's home and letting her live
there rent free and putting your kids
through private school
no Harlan Crowe wasn't trying to
purchase influence from a Supreme Court
Justice perished the thought
they're just Buddies
so what now
the answer is actually pretty simple
it's government 101 it's governing 101.
subpoena the information from Harlan
Crowe then subpoena him to testify
let him fight the subpoenas in court he
will lose
and then part two of the simple answer
governing 101 the Department of Justice
should open an investigation
in what seemed to be pretty obvious
violations of public Financial
disclosure laws by Clarence Thomas
you know the integrity and legitimacy of
the United States Supreme Court is too
important not to investigate
Thomas's obvious transgressions
and
because Justice
matters
gloves off
friends gloves off
as always please stay safe please stay
tuned and I look forward to talking with
you all again soon
[Music]
by Glenn Kirschner
May 14, 2023 #TeamJustice
ProPublica recently revealed that Republican billionaire Harlan Crow lavished extravagant trips and accommodations on Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Then it was revealed that Crow also bought Thomas's mother's house and let her live there rent free. But wait, there's more - Crow reportedly payed private school tuition for a grandnephew Thomas was raising as a son.
Not surprisingly, the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Finance Committee demanded Crow provide information about the lavish gifts, benefits and payments to Thomas and his family, in an effort to investigate what kind of legislative fixes need to be enacted to address what appears to be rampant influence peddling and purchasing.
Crow just told the Senate Finance Committee that he will NOT be providing the requested evidence. And wait until you hear the reasons Crow gave for why he was refusing to cooperate with the Senate.
Transcript
so friends a republican billionaire Mega
donor who has been lavishing extravagant
expensive gifts and benefits on Supreme
Court Justice Clarence Thomas just told
the senate committee
no I won't be providing you information
about any of that
about what is essentially his Supreme
Court influence operation
let's talk about that
because Justice matters
[Music]
[Music]
hey all Glenn kirschner here
so friends recent reporting by
propublica revealed that Republican
billionaire megadon or Harlan Crow has
for a very long time been lavishing
millions of dollars worth of luxury
trips and accommodations on Supreme
Court Justice Clarence Thomas
Crowe also reportedly purchased Thomas's
mother's home dumped all kinds of money
into it to make improvements and then of
course let Thomas's mother live there
rent free Crow reportedly paid the
private school tuition of Clarence
Thomas's I believe Grand nephew who he
raises as a son
etc
etc
etc so not surprisingly
Senate committees have requested
information and accounting from crow
about how much money he has dumped into
Clarence Thomas and his family members
in what is a pretty transparent
influence peddling operation
are you ready for Harlan Crow's reply
headline from NBC News Harlan crowed
declines to provide Senate finance
committee with list of gifts he has
given to Justice Clarence Thomas
because of course he declined
the article begins Republican donor
Harlan Crowe wrote in a letter to the
Senate finance committee that he will
not provide a list of gifts he gave to
Justice Clarence Thomas who has faced
recent calls to step down
to resign
to leave the Supreme Court because you
have disgraced this nation
those are my editorial Editions
the article continues
Crow conveyed that decision to committee
chairman Senator Ron Wyden which a
representative for Crow provided to NBC
News
Wyden spokesperson Ryan Carey also
confirmed to NBC that the committee had
received Crowe's letter
friends here's what Crow said
quote we have serious concerns about the
scope of and Authority for this inquiry
as you are aware the committee's powers
to investigate are not unlimited the
letter from Crow's lawyer Michael Bopp
said
the Senate finance committee Bop argued
lacks a legislative purpose in its
request for the list of gifts saying
that the Supreme Court has explicitly
stated that Congress has no authority to
engage in law enforcement investigations
or to conduct investigations aimed at
exposing citizens Private Affairs for
the sake of exposure
the committee also lacks the authority
to conduct a tax audit Bop wrote for the
purpose of determining whether Justice
Thomas complied with ethical standards
the chairman believes should apply in
this instance
in addition Bob said that the panel's
inquiry targeting a Supreme Court
Justice raises substantial separation of
powers concerns
the letter argues that the crows whom
Bob said have been friends with the
Thomases for more than 20 years have
provided Hospitality to the justice and
his family
the IRS Bob wrote has not been
aggressive in arguing a gift tax law
applies in that context
he also said that the sale of properties
related to Thomas which the judge didn't
disclose
complied with federal and state gift tax
laws
wow just
wow
so let's take Harlan Crowe and his
lawyer Mr Bops assertions one at a time
first of all
we have serious concerns about the scope
of and Authority for this inquiry as you
are aware the committee's powers to
investigate are not unlimited I'm quite
sure the committee is aware of its own
powers and the limits thereof
the Senate finance committee lacks a
legislative purpose in its request for
the list of gifts well let's see
maybe Congress should legislate more
robust and farther reaching Financial
disclosure requirements on Supreme Court
Justices and maybe they should legislate
and increase the penalties for knowing
obvious intentional transparent
violations of those financial disclosure
requirements maybe those penalties
should include significant periods of
incarceration if you violate the law and
you abuse the public trust and you
denigrate the legitimacy of the Supreme
Court
as Clarence Thomas has done frankly this
is a legislative purpose Palooza
let's take on Mr Bops next complaint
the committee also lacks the authority
to conduct a tax audit for the purpose
of determining whether Justice Thomas
complied with ethical standards the
chairman believes should apply in this
instance
so what now Harlan Crowe and his
attorney Mr bopper are also representing
the interests of Clarence Thomas they're
defending him they're suggesting he did
nothing wrong don't look at his tax
returns
whatever you do
don't check to see if Clarence Thomas
fully and accurately and truthfully
reported all of the income all of the
benefits the in-kind donations the
tuition payments that he should have
reported no need to pull back that
curtain
but Mr Bop goes on
Bob said that the panel's inquiry
targeting a Supreme Court Justice raises
substantial separation of powers
concerns
wow so now
Harlan Crowe is raising the Grievances
of a co-equal branch of government the
Judiciary the judicial branch Harlan
Crowe believes I guess he gets to assert
that Congress the legislative branches
overstepping its its bounds separation
of powers you have no right to interfere
in the judicial branches business now
what is it that gives Harlan Crowe
standing to assert the the rights and
grievances of the judicial branch of
government
I mean maybe he does feel like a
dues-paying member right with all of the
money and benefits he's lavished on a
Supreme Court Justice maybe he feels
like he's an honorary member of the
Supreme Court right I mean goodness
knows he's paid enough to have influence
there but still he doesn't get to assert
a separation of powers concern that's
really not for him to decide when a
senate committee is seeking information
you know that's generally something we
leave up to the courts
uh Harlan
all right let's just do one more
Bob says that Harlan Crowe has been
friends with the Thomases for more than
20 years Harlan Crowe has provided
Hospitality to the justice and his
family friends has anybody ever provided
you Hospitality that included buying
your mother's home and letting her live
there rent free and putting your kids
through private school
no Harlan Crowe wasn't trying to
purchase influence from a Supreme Court
Justice perished the thought
they're just Buddies
so what now
the answer is actually pretty simple
it's government 101 it's governing 101.
subpoena the information from Harlan
Crowe then subpoena him to testify
let him fight the subpoenas in court he
will lose
and then part two of the simple answer
governing 101 the Department of Justice
should open an investigation
in what seemed to be pretty obvious
violations of public Financial
disclosure laws by Clarence Thomas
you know the integrity and legitimacy of
the United States Supreme Court is too
important not to investigate
Thomas's obvious transgressions
and
because Justice
matters
gloves off
friends gloves off
as always please stay safe please stay
tuned and I look forward to talking with
you all again soon
[Music]
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 37523
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Wed May 24, 2023 2:53 am
Lawrence: Why does Clarence Thomas’s billionaire friend own ‘the garden of evil’ & Hitler’s teapot?
by Lawrence O'Donnell
MSNBC
May 22, 2023 #msnbc #clarencethomas #harlancrow
MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell discusses GOP billionaire mega donor Harlan Crow’s defense of his relationship with Clarence Thomas, his collection of Nazi memorabilia and the statues of dictators that fill his "garden of evil."
Transcript
thank you
the owner of the Garden of Evil wants to
assure you
but the one thing he has never done in
his Garden of Evil
is discuss Supreme Court opinions with
Clarence Thomas
who is his best friend
Harlan Crowe and Clarence Thomas have
not used the term best friend to
describe one another but how could
Clarence Thomas ever
have a better friend
Texas billionaire Harlan Crowe who calls
his backyard The Garden of Evil because
it is populated with statues of some of
the most evil men in history
has allowed Clarence Thomas to live more
of the life of a billionaire than any of
us ever will the trips on the private
jets the trips on the yacht and Harlan
Crowe has pumped money directly into the
joint income of Clarence Thomas and his
wife Harlan Crowe contributed more than
enough money to fully fund Virginia
Thomas's salary at one of the places she
once worked and Harlan Khloe allows
Clarence Thomas's mother to live rent
free in a house that Harlan Crow bought
from Clarence Thomas
putting some of the purchase price of
that house directly into Clarence
Thomas's pocket Harlan Crowe then fixed
up the house now Clarence Thomas's
mother is living at no expense at all to
Clarence Thomas all thanks to the best
friend a Supreme Court Justice could
ever have as long as that Justice does
not mind being exposed as the most
corrupt Supreme Court Justice the court
has ever had
if there has been a more corrupt Supreme
Court Justice than Clarence Thomas
then that corruption
has remained Secret
no such corruption has ever been made
public
in an interview with the Atlantic
published today Harlan Crowe expresses
astonishment that anyone could ever be
concerned about the Integrity of
Clarence Thomas
I have never nor would I ever think
about talking about matters that relate
to the Judiciary with Justice Clarence
Thomas Crowe said he told the Atlantic
they talk about things like the weather
and sports and then decided to amend
that after the interview in an email
saying quote it is not realistic for two
people to be friends and not talk about
their jobs from time to time Thomas has
spoken to him of his fondness for his
clerics or about bumping into Justice
Stephen Breyer at Target but Crow wrote
that it would be wrong
for him to talk about court cases from
my point of view that is off limits he
and I don't go there and so if you're
comfortable
taking Texas billionaire Harlan Crowe's
word for it there's nothing to be
worried about
but it is hard to be comfortable with
anything that Harlan Crowe says
including quote the kids used to be
scared of them
that's what he said about the statues in
his Garden of Evil which include Lennon
and Starlin and other dictators from
around the world dead dictators
what manner of man
puts statues
of evildoers in his garden and then
enjoys them
what kind of father leaves them there
knowing that his kids
are scared by them
wandering around the Garden of Evil
Harlan Crowe told his Atlantic
interviewer quote I'm not looking to be
odd well he has failed miserably
the Atlantic makes the mistake of
printing the line he feels he has acted
with the purest and most honorable
intentions no one at the Atlantic knows
what Harlan Crowe feels but this is
exactly the kind of misconception that
access journalism always produces you
will see that kind of reporting in the
New York Times and everywhere that
access journalism is practiced the
journalistically correct way to deliver
that line would be to say he claims
he has acted with the purest and most
honorable intentions that leaves open
the possibility that he did act with the
purest and most honorable intentions and
it leaves open the possibility that he
didn't but the Atlantic has decided to
remove your option as a reader and
present to you as a fact that the
Atlantic knows what Harlan Crowe feels
the more you know about him the more
impossible it is to know what he feels
what would you feel
holding Hitler's teapot in your hand
could you do it
if you were in a room and were told
that was Hitler's teapot
would you touch it
would you want to
would your fingers be drawn to the
handle of that teapot that brought
Comfort to Adolf Hitler while he was
Exterminating six million Jews in his
death camps
what would it feel like to touch that
handle
if you dared
Harlan Crow knows
he owns the teapot
he claims it's important that such
things be preserved but do they need to
be preserved in his home
couldn't he after paying a Billionaire's
ransom for Hitler's teapot and pictures
painted by Hitler and Hitler's table
Linens couldn't Harlan Crow donate them
to the appropriate Archive of such
material
why own them
why have them in your home why sleep
under the same roof with Hitler's
possessions things Hitler touched
can the Atlantic tell us what Harlan
Crowe feels
when his hand grips
Hitler's teapot
can the Atlantic tell us what Harlan
Crowe feels when he falls asleep in a
house where he knows Hitler's paintings
are peacefully residing with him
Harlan Crowe decided to take Hitler's
paintings out of their normal display
position when he was doing a fundraiser
for failed presidential candidate Marco
Rubio in 2015. congresswoman Debbie
Wasserman Schultz complained then
publicly that Marco Rubio was going into
a home with Hitler's paintings for a
fundraiser so only in 2015 did it occur
to Harlan crow that maybe Hitler's
paintings shouldn't be on prominent
public display in his home
now the biggest most prominent painting
on display in his home is a portrait of
his best friend Clarence Thomas which
seems hardly controversial at all when
the alternative would be having Hitler's
paintings hanging there instead
Harlan Crowe owns a copy of Hitler's
book Mein Kampf signed by Adolf Hitler
so when Harlan Crowe is holding Hitler's
book in his hands he knows that Hitler
himself held this particular copy
of this book in his hands
I think I might feel as if my hands were
on fire
if I were forced to touch that book
how does Harlan Crowe feel
when he holds Hitler's book signed
by Hitler
we don't know
the Atlantic doesn't know
Harlan Crowe tells the Atlantic it's
kind of weird to think that if you're a
Justice on the Supreme Court you can't
have friends of course you can have
friends if you're on the Supreme Court
they all have friends
that's not the issue but it is entirely
possible that Harlem Crowe is not
intelligent enough
to actually see what the real issue is
Harlan Crowe was not asked if he thinks
there's the slightest chance that he
would have befriended Clarence Thomas if
Clarence Thomas were not a Supreme Court
Justice Harlan Pro went out of his way
to meet Clarence Thomas by giving him a
ride on his private jet in the fourth
year of Clarence Thomas's service on the
Supreme Court
he says they have discovered we share a
love of Motown
our own Crow complains to the Atlantic
if I go out and help an old lady across
the street this afternoon there'll be
something written about my diabolical
purpose and evil intent
has he ever helped an old lady across
the street
would he help her across the street
if she were not a Supreme Court Justice
despite his attempts to appear normal
and sound normal Harlan Crowe is indeed
somewhere far beyond
odd
about the Hitler paintings and Hitler
possessions in his home Harlan Crowe
told the Atlantic the idea that I might
offend somebody particularly somebody I
care about one of my friends with this
stuff that hurts I would never want to
do that Harlan Crowe was not asked if he
has any Jewish friends
did he think Debbie Wasserman Schultz
was kidding
when she publicly expressed her offense
but Harlan Crowe gave Hitler's paintings
and his teapot a happy home
Harlan Crowe was born in Texas in 1947
he was educated in the Deep South at the
height of the Civil Rights Movement how
did he feel about that
the Atlantic doesn't know and the
Atlantic didn't ask he went to college
in Atlanta while Martin Luther King was
preaching to his Atlanta congregation
across town Martin Luther King Jr was
the most famous person living in Atlanta
when Harlan Crowe went to college there
what did Harlan Crowe think about Martin
Luther King
the Atlantic did not ask
one of Harlan Crowe's neighbors is
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones here is
Jerry Jones in Little Rock Arkansas when
President Eisenhower used the American
Military to force the integration of a
public high school there
Jerry Jones was among the protesters
Jerry Jones was there to protest
integration and cheer on and try to
maintain
segregation
what was Harlan Crowe doing that day
what was he feeling as the whole country
watched
that horrible display of racism in
Little Rock Arkansas that day the whole
country was watching
has Harlan Crowe ever talked to his
neighbor Jerry Jones about that day
there are no segregationists in Harlan
Crow's Garden of Evil there are no
American slave owners in Harlan Pro's
Garden of Evil Harlan Crowe claims to
abhor Donald Trump
but there is no Trump statue
In The Garden of Evil
[Music]
thank you
by Lawrence O'Donnell
MSNBC
May 22, 2023 #msnbc #clarencethomas #harlancrow
MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell discusses GOP billionaire mega donor Harlan Crow’s defense of his relationship with Clarence Thomas, his collection of Nazi memorabilia and the statues of dictators that fill his "garden of evil."
Transcript
thank you
the owner of the Garden of Evil wants to
assure you
but the one thing he has never done in
his Garden of Evil
is discuss Supreme Court opinions with
Clarence Thomas
who is his best friend
Harlan Crowe and Clarence Thomas have
not used the term best friend to
describe one another but how could
Clarence Thomas ever
have a better friend
Texas billionaire Harlan Crowe who calls
his backyard The Garden of Evil because
it is populated with statues of some of
the most evil men in history
has allowed Clarence Thomas to live more
of the life of a billionaire than any of
us ever will the trips on the private
jets the trips on the yacht and Harlan
Crowe has pumped money directly into the
joint income of Clarence Thomas and his
wife Harlan Crowe contributed more than
enough money to fully fund Virginia
Thomas's salary at one of the places she
once worked and Harlan Khloe allows
Clarence Thomas's mother to live rent
free in a house that Harlan Crow bought
from Clarence Thomas
putting some of the purchase price of
that house directly into Clarence
Thomas's pocket Harlan Crowe then fixed
up the house now Clarence Thomas's
mother is living at no expense at all to
Clarence Thomas all thanks to the best
friend a Supreme Court Justice could
ever have as long as that Justice does
not mind being exposed as the most
corrupt Supreme Court Justice the court
has ever had
if there has been a more corrupt Supreme
Court Justice than Clarence Thomas
then that corruption
has remained Secret
no such corruption has ever been made
public
in an interview with the Atlantic
published today Harlan Crowe expresses
astonishment that anyone could ever be
concerned about the Integrity of
Clarence Thomas
I have never nor would I ever think
about talking about matters that relate
to the Judiciary with Justice Clarence
Thomas Crowe said he told the Atlantic
they talk about things like the weather
and sports and then decided to amend
that after the interview in an email
saying quote it is not realistic for two
people to be friends and not talk about
their jobs from time to time Thomas has
spoken to him of his fondness for his
clerics or about bumping into Justice
Stephen Breyer at Target but Crow wrote
that it would be wrong
for him to talk about court cases from
my point of view that is off limits he
and I don't go there and so if you're
comfortable
taking Texas billionaire Harlan Crowe's
word for it there's nothing to be
worried about
but it is hard to be comfortable with
anything that Harlan Crowe says
including quote the kids used to be
scared of them
that's what he said about the statues in
his Garden of Evil which include Lennon
and Starlin and other dictators from
around the world dead dictators
what manner of man
puts statues
of evildoers in his garden and then
enjoys them
what kind of father leaves them there
knowing that his kids
are scared by them
wandering around the Garden of Evil
Harlan Crowe told his Atlantic
interviewer quote I'm not looking to be
odd well he has failed miserably
the Atlantic makes the mistake of
printing the line he feels he has acted
with the purest and most honorable
intentions no one at the Atlantic knows
what Harlan Crowe feels but this is
exactly the kind of misconception that
access journalism always produces you
will see that kind of reporting in the
New York Times and everywhere that
access journalism is practiced the
journalistically correct way to deliver
that line would be to say he claims
he has acted with the purest and most
honorable intentions that leaves open
the possibility that he did act with the
purest and most honorable intentions and
it leaves open the possibility that he
didn't but the Atlantic has decided to
remove your option as a reader and
present to you as a fact that the
Atlantic knows what Harlan Crowe feels
the more you know about him the more
impossible it is to know what he feels
what would you feel
holding Hitler's teapot in your hand
could you do it
if you were in a room and were told
that was Hitler's teapot
would you touch it
would you want to
would your fingers be drawn to the
handle of that teapot that brought
Comfort to Adolf Hitler while he was
Exterminating six million Jews in his
death camps
what would it feel like to touch that
handle
if you dared
Harlan Crow knows
he owns the teapot
he claims it's important that such
things be preserved but do they need to
be preserved in his home
couldn't he after paying a Billionaire's
ransom for Hitler's teapot and pictures
painted by Hitler and Hitler's table
Linens couldn't Harlan Crow donate them
to the appropriate Archive of such
material
why own them
why have them in your home why sleep
under the same roof with Hitler's
possessions things Hitler touched
can the Atlantic tell us what Harlan
Crowe feels
when his hand grips
Hitler's teapot
can the Atlantic tell us what Harlan
Crowe feels when he falls asleep in a
house where he knows Hitler's paintings
are peacefully residing with him
Harlan Crowe decided to take Hitler's
paintings out of their normal display
position when he was doing a fundraiser
for failed presidential candidate Marco
Rubio in 2015. congresswoman Debbie
Wasserman Schultz complained then
publicly that Marco Rubio was going into
a home with Hitler's paintings for a
fundraiser so only in 2015 did it occur
to Harlan crow that maybe Hitler's
paintings shouldn't be on prominent
public display in his home
now the biggest most prominent painting
on display in his home is a portrait of
his best friend Clarence Thomas which
seems hardly controversial at all when
the alternative would be having Hitler's
paintings hanging there instead
Harlan Crowe owns a copy of Hitler's
book Mein Kampf signed by Adolf Hitler
so when Harlan Crowe is holding Hitler's
book in his hands he knows that Hitler
himself held this particular copy
of this book in his hands
I think I might feel as if my hands were
on fire
if I were forced to touch that book
how does Harlan Crowe feel
when he holds Hitler's book signed
by Hitler
we don't know
the Atlantic doesn't know
Harlan Crowe tells the Atlantic it's
kind of weird to think that if you're a
Justice on the Supreme Court you can't
have friends of course you can have
friends if you're on the Supreme Court
they all have friends
that's not the issue but it is entirely
possible that Harlem Crowe is not
intelligent enough
to actually see what the real issue is
Harlan Crowe was not asked if he thinks
there's the slightest chance that he
would have befriended Clarence Thomas if
Clarence Thomas were not a Supreme Court
Justice Harlan Pro went out of his way
to meet Clarence Thomas by giving him a
ride on his private jet in the fourth
year of Clarence Thomas's service on the
Supreme Court
he says they have discovered we share a
love of Motown
our own Crow complains to the Atlantic
if I go out and help an old lady across
the street this afternoon there'll be
something written about my diabolical
purpose and evil intent
has he ever helped an old lady across
the street
would he help her across the street
if she were not a Supreme Court Justice
despite his attempts to appear normal
and sound normal Harlan Crowe is indeed
somewhere far beyond
odd
about the Hitler paintings and Hitler
possessions in his home Harlan Crowe
told the Atlantic the idea that I might
offend somebody particularly somebody I
care about one of my friends with this
stuff that hurts I would never want to
do that Harlan Crowe was not asked if he
has any Jewish friends
did he think Debbie Wasserman Schultz
was kidding
when she publicly expressed her offense
but Harlan Crowe gave Hitler's paintings
and his teapot a happy home
Harlan Crowe was born in Texas in 1947
he was educated in the Deep South at the
height of the Civil Rights Movement how
did he feel about that
the Atlantic doesn't know and the
Atlantic didn't ask he went to college
in Atlanta while Martin Luther King was
preaching to his Atlanta congregation
across town Martin Luther King Jr was
the most famous person living in Atlanta
when Harlan Crowe went to college there
what did Harlan Crowe think about Martin
Luther King
the Atlantic did not ask
one of Harlan Crowe's neighbors is
Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones here is
Jerry Jones in Little Rock Arkansas when
President Eisenhower used the American
Military to force the integration of a
public high school there
Jerry Jones was among the protesters
Jerry Jones was there to protest
integration and cheer on and try to
maintain
segregation
what was Harlan Crowe doing that day
what was he feeling as the whole country
watched
that horrible display of racism in
Little Rock Arkansas that day the whole
country was watching
has Harlan Crowe ever talked to his
neighbor Jerry Jones about that day
there are no segregationists in Harlan
Crow's Garden of Evil there are no
American slave owners in Harlan Pro's
Garden of Evil Harlan Crowe claims to
abhor Donald Trump
but there is no Trump statue
In The Garden of Evil
[Music]
thank you
- admin
- Site Admin
- Posts: 37523
- Joined: Thu Aug 01, 2013 5:21 am
Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Fri Jul 14, 2023 8:26 pm
Lawyers with supreme court business paid Clarence Thomas aide via Venmo: Payments to Rajan Vasisht, an aide from 2019-21, underscore ties between the justice and lawyers who argue cases in front of him
by Stephanie Kirchgaessner in Washington @skirchy
The Guardian
Wed 12 Jul 2023 06.00 EDT
Luxury trips and property deals: supreme court controversies explained
Several lawyers who have had business before the supreme court, including one who successfully argued to end race-conscious admissions at universities, paid money to a top aide to Justice Clarence Thomas, according to the aide’s Venmo transactions. The payments appear to have been made in connection to Thomas’s 2019 Christmas party.
The payments to Rajan Vasisht, who served as Thomas’s aide from July 2019 to July 2021, seem to underscore the close ties between Thomas, who is embroiled in ethics scandals following a series of revelations about his relationship with a wealthy billionaire donor, and certain senior Washington lawyers who argue cases and have other business in front of the justice.
Vasisht’s Venmo account – which was public prior to requesting comment for this article and is no longer – show that he received seven payments in November and December 2019 from lawyers who previously served as Thomas legal clerks. The amount of the payments is not disclosed, but the purpose of each payment is listed as either “Christmas party”, “Thomas Christmas Party”, “CT Christmas Party” or “CT Xmas party”, in an apparent reference to the justice’s initials.
However, it remains unclear what the funds were for.
The lawyers who made the Venmo transactions were: Patrick Strawbridge, a partner at Consovoy McCarthy who recently successfully argued that affirmative action violated the US constitution; Kate Todd, who served as White House deputy counsel under Donald Trump at the time of the payment and is now a managing party of Ellis George Cipollone’s law office; Elbert Lin, the former solicitor general of West Virginia who played a key role in a supreme court case that limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions; and Brian Schmalzbach, a partner at McGuire Woods who has argued multiple cases before the supreme court.
Other lawyers who made payments include Manuel Valle, a graduate of Hillsdale College and the University of Chicago Law School who clerked for Thomas last year and is currently working as a managing associate at Sidley, and Liam Hardy, who was working at the Department of Justice’s office of legal counsel at the time the payment was made and now serves as an appeals court judge for the armed forces.
Will Consovoy, who died earlier this year, also made a payment. Consovoy clerked for Thomas during the 2008-09 term and was considered a rising star in conservative legal circles. After his death, the New York Times reported that Consovoy had come away from his time working for Thomas “with the conviction that the court was poised to tilt further to the right – and that constitutional rulings that had once been considered out of reach by conservatives, on issues like voting rights, abortion and affirmative action, would suddenly be within grasp”.
None of the lawyers who made payments responded to emailed questions from the Guardian.
According to his résumé, Vasisht’s duties included assisting the justice with the administrative functioning of his chambers, including personal correspondence and his personal and office schedule.
Vasisht did not respond to an emailed list of questions from the Guardian, including questions about who solicited the payments, how much individuals paid, and what the purpose of the payments was. The Guardian also asked questions about the nature of Thomas’s Christmas party, how many guests were invited and where the event took place.
Reached via WhatsApp and asked if he would make a statement, Vasisht replied: “No thank you, I do not want to be contacted.”
Legal experts said the payments to Vasisht raised red flags.
Richard Painter, who served as the chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W Bush administration and has been a vocal critic of the role of dark money in politics, said it was “not appropriate” for former Thomas law clerks who were established in private practice to – in effect – send money to the supreme court via Venmo.
“There is no excuse for it. Thomas could invite them to his Christmas party and he could attend Christmas parties, as long as they are not discussing any cases. His Christmas party should not be paid for by lawyers,” Painter said. “A federal government employee collecting money from lawyers for any reason … I don’t see how that works.”
Painter said he would possibly make an exception if recent law clerks were paying their own way for a party. But almost all of the lawyers who made the payments are senior litigators at big law firms.
Kedric Payne, the general counsel and senior director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, said that – based on available information – it was possible that the former clerks were paying their own party expenses, and not expenses for Thomas, which he believed was different than random lawyers in effect paying admission to an exclusive event to influence the judge.
He added: “But the point remains that the public is owed an explanation so they don’t have to speculate.”
Thomas has been embroiled in ethics scandals for weeks following bombshell revelations by ProPublica, the investigative outlet which published new revelations about how the billionaire conservative donor Harlan Crow has paid for lavish holidays for the justice, bought Thomas’s mother’s home, and paid for the judge’s great-nephew’s private school education. The stories have prompted an outcry on Capitol Hill, where Democrats have called for the passage of new ethics rules.
Thomas is known for having close relationships with his former clerks. A 2019 article in the Atlantic noted that the rightwing justice has a “vast network” of former clerks and mentees who are now serving as federal judges and served in senior positions throughout the Trump administration. The large presence of former Thomas clerks, the Atlantic noted, meant that the “notoriously silent justice may end up with an outsize voice in the legal system for years to come”.
Thomas’s chamber did not respond to a request for comment.
by Stephanie Kirchgaessner in Washington @skirchy
The Guardian
Wed 12 Jul 2023 06.00 EDT
Luxury trips and property deals: supreme court controversies explained
Several lawyers who have had business before the supreme court, including one who successfully argued to end race-conscious admissions at universities, paid money to a top aide to Justice Clarence Thomas, according to the aide’s Venmo transactions. The payments appear to have been made in connection to Thomas’s 2019 Christmas party.
The payments to Rajan Vasisht, who served as Thomas’s aide from July 2019 to July 2021, seem to underscore the close ties between Thomas, who is embroiled in ethics scandals following a series of revelations about his relationship with a wealthy billionaire donor, and certain senior Washington lawyers who argue cases and have other business in front of the justice.
Vasisht’s Venmo account – which was public prior to requesting comment for this article and is no longer – show that he received seven payments in November and December 2019 from lawyers who previously served as Thomas legal clerks. The amount of the payments is not disclosed, but the purpose of each payment is listed as either “Christmas party”, “Thomas Christmas Party”, “CT Christmas Party” or “CT Xmas party”, in an apparent reference to the justice’s initials.
However, it remains unclear what the funds were for.
The lawyers who made the Venmo transactions were: Patrick Strawbridge, a partner at Consovoy McCarthy who recently successfully argued that affirmative action violated the US constitution; Kate Todd, who served as White House deputy counsel under Donald Trump at the time of the payment and is now a managing party of Ellis George Cipollone’s law office; Elbert Lin, the former solicitor general of West Virginia who played a key role in a supreme court case that limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate greenhouse gas emissions; and Brian Schmalzbach, a partner at McGuire Woods who has argued multiple cases before the supreme court.
Other lawyers who made payments include Manuel Valle, a graduate of Hillsdale College and the University of Chicago Law School who clerked for Thomas last year and is currently working as a managing associate at Sidley, and Liam Hardy, who was working at the Department of Justice’s office of legal counsel at the time the payment was made and now serves as an appeals court judge for the armed forces.
Will Consovoy, who died earlier this year, also made a payment. Consovoy clerked for Thomas during the 2008-09 term and was considered a rising star in conservative legal circles. After his death, the New York Times reported that Consovoy had come away from his time working for Thomas “with the conviction that the court was poised to tilt further to the right – and that constitutional rulings that had once been considered out of reach by conservatives, on issues like voting rights, abortion and affirmative action, would suddenly be within grasp”.
None of the lawyers who made payments responded to emailed questions from the Guardian.
According to his résumé, Vasisht’s duties included assisting the justice with the administrative functioning of his chambers, including personal correspondence and his personal and office schedule.
Vasisht did not respond to an emailed list of questions from the Guardian, including questions about who solicited the payments, how much individuals paid, and what the purpose of the payments was. The Guardian also asked questions about the nature of Thomas’s Christmas party, how many guests were invited and where the event took place.
Reached via WhatsApp and asked if he would make a statement, Vasisht replied: “No thank you, I do not want to be contacted.”
Legal experts said the payments to Vasisht raised red flags.
Richard Painter, who served as the chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W Bush administration and has been a vocal critic of the role of dark money in politics, said it was “not appropriate” for former Thomas law clerks who were established in private practice to – in effect – send money to the supreme court via Venmo.
“There is no excuse for it. Thomas could invite them to his Christmas party and he could attend Christmas parties, as long as they are not discussing any cases. His Christmas party should not be paid for by lawyers,” Painter said. “A federal government employee collecting money from lawyers for any reason … I don’t see how that works.”
Painter said he would possibly make an exception if recent law clerks were paying their own way for a party. But almost all of the lawyers who made the payments are senior litigators at big law firms.
Kedric Payne, the general counsel and senior director of ethics at the Campaign Legal Center, said that – based on available information – it was possible that the former clerks were paying their own party expenses, and not expenses for Thomas, which he believed was different than random lawyers in effect paying admission to an exclusive event to influence the judge.
He added: “But the point remains that the public is owed an explanation so they don’t have to speculate.”
Thomas has been embroiled in ethics scandals for weeks following bombshell revelations by ProPublica, the investigative outlet which published new revelations about how the billionaire conservative donor Harlan Crow has paid for lavish holidays for the justice, bought Thomas’s mother’s home, and paid for the judge’s great-nephew’s private school education. The stories have prompted an outcry on Capitol Hill, where Democrats have called for the passage of new ethics rules.
Thomas is known for having close relationships with his former clerks. A 2019 article in the Atlantic noted that the rightwing justice has a “vast network” of former clerks and mentees who are now serving as federal judges and served in senior positions throughout the Trump administration. The large presence of former Thomas clerks, the Atlantic noted, meant that the “notoriously silent justice may end up with an outsize voice in the legal system for years to come”.
Thomas’s chamber did not respond to a request for comment.
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Fri Jul 14, 2023 11:25 pm
A Federal Judge Asks: Does the Supreme Court Realize How Bad It Smells?
by Michael Ponsor
New York Times
July 14, 2023
Judge Pansor is a senior judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
What has gone wrong with the Su preme Court's sense of smell?
I joined the federal bench in 1984, some years before any of the justices currently on the Supreme Court. Throughout my career, I have been bound and guided by a written code of conduct, backed by a committee of colleagues I can call on for advice. In fact, I checked with a member of that committee before writing this essay.
A few times in my nearly 40 years on the bench, complaints have been filed against me. This is not uncommon for a federal judge. So far, none have been found to have merit, but all of these complaints have been processed with respect, and I have paid close attention to them.
The Supreme Court has avoided imposing a formal ethical apparatus on itself like the one that applies to all other federal judges. I understand the general concern, in part. A complaint mechanism could become a political tool to paralyze the court or a playground for gadflies. However, a skillfully drafted code could overcome this problem. Even a nonenforceable code that the justices formally pledged to respect would be an improvement on the current void.
Reasonable people may disagree on this. The more important, uncontroversial point is that if there will not be formal ethical constraints on our Supreme Court, or even if there will be, its justices must have functioning noses. They must keep themselves far from any conduct with a dubious aroma, even if it may not breach a formal rule.
The fact is, when you become a judge, stuff happens. Many years ago, as a fairly new federal magistrate judge, I was chatting about our kids with a local attorney I knew only slightly. As our conversation unfolded, he mentioned that he'd been planning to take his 10-year-old to a Red Sox game that weekend but their plan had fallen through. Would I like to use his tickets?
I was tempted. The tickets were beyond my usual price range, and the game would be a fun outing with my 7-year-old. It didn't seem to me that the lawyer was trying to do anything improper. It seemed to be - and almost certainly was - just a spur-of-the-moment impulse arising out of a friendly conversation. Moreover, the seats at Fenway Park, like the much more expensive seat on the private jet used free by Justice Samuel Alito on his Alaska vacation, would probably go empty if I didn't take them. Who would be harmed?
To my chagrin, as I pondered the situation, I became aware of an aroma of something off. Not an actual smell, of course, but something like that - something like a whiff of milk on the verge of going sour or a pan left on the stove too long. It wasn't that the lawyer had evil intent; it was that I was approaching a boundary. Silently gnashing my teeth, I turned the tickets down.
A few years later, after I'd received my appointment as a life-tenured U.S. district judge, I issued a decision reversing the Social Security Administration's denial of disability benefits to an older plaintiff. I was in our clerk's office one day when the man and his wife approached me with a package. He had a woodworking hobby, and inside the package was an exquisitely crafted oak pencil case with bronze hinges. My ruling had made a big difference for them, and they wanted to extend this modest, personal gesture of gratitude. Again, they were obviously not being underhanded. Their lawsuit was over, and this was probably the last they would ever see of me. Nevertheless, as my police officer friends tell me, the road to perdition starts with a free cup of coffee. As politely as I could, I turned the pencil case down. It still pains me to remember their embarrassed, crestfallen faces.
All my judicial colleagues, whoever has appointed them, run into situations like these regularly, and I expect they have responded in just the same way. You don't just stay inside the lines; you stay well inside the lines. This is not a matter of politics or judicial philosophy. It is ethics in the trenches.
The recent descriptions of the behavior of some of our justices and particularly their attempts to defend their conduct have not just raised my eyebrows, they've raised the whole top of my head. Lavish, no-cost vacations? Hypertechnical arguments about how a private airplane flight is a kind of facility? A justice's spouse prominently involved in advocating on issues before the court without the justice's recusal? Repeated omissions in mandatory financial disclosure statements brushed under the rug as inadvertent? A justice's taxpayer-financed staff reportedly helping to promote her books? Private school tuition for a justice's family member covered by a wealthy benefactor? Wow.
Although the exact numbers fluctuate because of vacancies, the core of our federal judiciary comprises roughly 540 magistrate judges, 670 district judges, 180 appeals court judges and nine Supreme Court justices - fewer than 1,500 men and women in a country of more than 330 million people and 3.8 million square miles. Much depends on this small cohort's acute sense of smell, its instinctive, uncompromising integrity and its appearance of integrity. If reports are true, some of our justices are, sadly, letting us down.
To me, this feels personal. For the country, it feels ominous. What in the world has happened to the Supreme Court's nose?
Michael Pansor is a senior judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
by Michael Ponsor
New York Times
July 14, 2023
Judge Pansor is a senior judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
What has gone wrong with the Su preme Court's sense of smell?
I joined the federal bench in 1984, some years before any of the justices currently on the Supreme Court. Throughout my career, I have been bound and guided by a written code of conduct, backed by a committee of colleagues I can call on for advice. In fact, I checked with a member of that committee before writing this essay.
A few times in my nearly 40 years on the bench, complaints have been filed against me. This is not uncommon for a federal judge. So far, none have been found to have merit, but all of these complaints have been processed with respect, and I have paid close attention to them.
The Supreme Court has avoided imposing a formal ethical apparatus on itself like the one that applies to all other federal judges. I understand the general concern, in part. A complaint mechanism could become a political tool to paralyze the court or a playground for gadflies. However, a skillfully drafted code could overcome this problem. Even a nonenforceable code that the justices formally pledged to respect would be an improvement on the current void.
Reasonable people may disagree on this. The more important, uncontroversial point is that if there will not be formal ethical constraints on our Supreme Court, or even if there will be, its justices must have functioning noses. They must keep themselves far from any conduct with a dubious aroma, even if it may not breach a formal rule.
The fact is, when you become a judge, stuff happens. Many years ago, as a fairly new federal magistrate judge, I was chatting about our kids with a local attorney I knew only slightly. As our conversation unfolded, he mentioned that he'd been planning to take his 10-year-old to a Red Sox game that weekend but their plan had fallen through. Would I like to use his tickets?
I was tempted. The tickets were beyond my usual price range, and the game would be a fun outing with my 7-year-old. It didn't seem to me that the lawyer was trying to do anything improper. It seemed to be - and almost certainly was - just a spur-of-the-moment impulse arising out of a friendly conversation. Moreover, the seats at Fenway Park, like the much more expensive seat on the private jet used free by Justice Samuel Alito on his Alaska vacation, would probably go empty if I didn't take them. Who would be harmed?
To my chagrin, as I pondered the situation, I became aware of an aroma of something off. Not an actual smell, of course, but something like that - something like a whiff of milk on the verge of going sour or a pan left on the stove too long. It wasn't that the lawyer had evil intent; it was that I was approaching a boundary. Silently gnashing my teeth, I turned the tickets down.
A few years later, after I'd received my appointment as a life-tenured U.S. district judge, I issued a decision reversing the Social Security Administration's denial of disability benefits to an older plaintiff. I was in our clerk's office one day when the man and his wife approached me with a package. He had a woodworking hobby, and inside the package was an exquisitely crafted oak pencil case with bronze hinges. My ruling had made a big difference for them, and they wanted to extend this modest, personal gesture of gratitude. Again, they were obviously not being underhanded. Their lawsuit was over, and this was probably the last they would ever see of me. Nevertheless, as my police officer friends tell me, the road to perdition starts with a free cup of coffee. As politely as I could, I turned the pencil case down. It still pains me to remember their embarrassed, crestfallen faces.
All my judicial colleagues, whoever has appointed them, run into situations like these regularly, and I expect they have responded in just the same way. You don't just stay inside the lines; you stay well inside the lines. This is not a matter of politics or judicial philosophy. It is ethics in the trenches.
The recent descriptions of the behavior of some of our justices and particularly their attempts to defend their conduct have not just raised my eyebrows, they've raised the whole top of my head. Lavish, no-cost vacations? Hypertechnical arguments about how a private airplane flight is a kind of facility? A justice's spouse prominently involved in advocating on issues before the court without the justice's recusal? Repeated omissions in mandatory financial disclosure statements brushed under the rug as inadvertent? A justice's taxpayer-financed staff reportedly helping to promote her books? Private school tuition for a justice's family member covered by a wealthy benefactor? Wow.
Although the exact numbers fluctuate because of vacancies, the core of our federal judiciary comprises roughly 540 magistrate judges, 670 district judges, 180 appeals court judges and nine Supreme Court justices - fewer than 1,500 men and women in a country of more than 330 million people and 3.8 million square miles. Much depends on this small cohort's acute sense of smell, its instinctive, uncompromising integrity and its appearance of integrity. If reports are true, some of our justices are, sadly, letting us down.
To me, this feels personal. For the country, it feels ominous. What in the world has happened to the Supreme Court's nose?
Michael Pansor is a senior judge on the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Sun Aug 06, 2023 12:05 am
Supreme Court Justice Issues DANGEROUS STATEMENT [ “I know this is a controversial view, but I’m willing to say it ... No provision in the Constitution gives them the authority to regulate the Supreme Court — period.”] and Democrats FIGHT BACK
by Michael Popok
MeidasTouch
Aug 5, 2023
Michael Popok of Legal AF reports on the battle brewing between Supreme Court Justice Sam Alito and Senator democrats, as Alito tells the Wall Street Journal that Congress is powerless to impose a code of ethics and conduct on the Supreme Court, and Senator Murphy fires back on national television.
Transcript
go to something that you and your
Democratic colleagues are working on in
the Senate and that is a code of conduct
for the Supreme Court I mean this is
something you introduce regularly but we
did get a response this week from
Supreme Court Justice Samuel lolito and
he said quote I know this is a
controversial view but I'm willing to
say it no provision in the Constitution
gives them meaning Congress the
authority to regulate the Supreme Court
period what do you think he is saying
there and what is your response
first of all it's just stunningly wrong
and and he
um should know that more than anyone
else because his seat on the Supreme
Court exists only because of an Act
passed by Congress it is Congress that
establishes the number of justices on
the Supreme Court it is Congress that
has passed in the past requirements for
justices to disclose certain information
and so it is just wrong on the facts to
say that Congress doesn't have anything
to do with the rules guiding the Supreme
Court in fact from the very beginning
Congress has set those rules but it is
even more disturbing that Alito feels
the need to insert himself into a
congressional debate and it is just more
evidence that these justices on the
Supreme Court these conservative
justices just see themselves as
politicians they just see themselves as
a second legislative body that has just
as much power and right to impose their
political will on the country as
Congress does they're going to bend the
law in order to impose their right-wing
view of how the country should work on
the rest of us and it's why we need to
pass this Common Sense ethics
legislation to at least make sure we
know that these guys aren't in bed
having their Lifestyles paid for by
conservative donors as we have
unfortunately seen uh in these latest
Revelations
this is Michael popock legally AF that
video sets up the Battle Royale between
the Supreme Court Sam Alito and the
Senate Democrats over whether we are
finally once and for all going to have a
U.S Supreme Court that adheres to a code
of conduct a code of ethics mandatory
disqualification the disclosure of
Financial
inter-relationships and entanglements
between parties before the court and
judges sitting up on that bench are we
going to have that or are we not are we
a country of law or of men which is it
it can't be both and this constant
ridiculous struggle where the Supreme
Court says we're we're above ethics
we're above codes of responsibility
really I mean last I looked you were
people human beings that put on your
pants one at a time and you're given the
highest honor in the the country
being confirmed to be one of nine U.S
Supreme Court Justices for a lifetime
appointment you don't think that comes
along with responsibility
certainly Chris Murphy does and Chris
Murphy's just schooled judge Alito and
told him I don't know what you're
talking about it is that he's
flabbergasted by two things one the fact
that Alito who's supposed to be part of
the judicial branch has intervened in
the world of politics and is effectively
lobbying Congress and getting in the
middle of the legislative branch
separation of powers co-equal branches
occupying their own spheres you're not
supposed to color outside the lines and
do it so blatantly and transparently
it's the only thing transparent about
San molito is his transparent lobbying
politically because he's trying to tell
his bosses in Congress because they are
and Chris Murphy just told them why
um that he's above the law that he's a
below he's above ethics and he's above
transparency when it comes to his
financial entanglements with right wing
people
so you saw how we got there that was
Chris Murphy today on or a Sunday
morning talk show responding to Sam
Alito but the Wall Street Journal
article was from a couple of days ago
and that article written by uh Paul
Rifkin and James tarante is entitled
Samuel Alito the Supreme Court's a plane
spoken Defender that was the title of
the article and buried in the article
which was a four-hour interview that Sam
Leto gave it was like a very fawning
puff piece put out by the Wall Street
Journal four hours calling Sam Alito at
one point and important Justice with a
distinctive uh stop interpretive style
that's one way of putting it but during
that interview he said and I quote and
you can hear it in Chris Murphy's video
that I played that uh he says I know
this is a controversial thing to say but
Congress nowhere in the Constitution no
there's no provision of the Constitution
that gives Congress the authority to
regulate the Supreme Court period
meaning back off you don't have the
right or the ability to impose a code of
conduct or code of ethics on the Supreme
Court and you heard Chris Murphy said
what are you talking about it is
Congress
it is congress's Power by which Sam
Alito and the others their seat even
exists right that was an act of Congress
it's an act of Congress that sets the
number of Supreme Court Justices its
Congress that passed and imposes a
financial disclosure obligations on the
Supreme Court and it's Congress that
controls the purse string all the money
that John Roberts is spending as the
head of the of the Judiciary the
judicial branch for all of its court
system and Court personnel and judges
and clerks and courthouses you ever seen
some of these courthouses these
Limestone buildings running three four
five eight hundred million dollars a
piece in cities that has to be approved
through Congress okay they don't have
their own slush fund not that I'm aware
of to pay for that so to say that
Congress has to back out and not have
oversight over a branch for which they
fund
right just shows you the depth of
immorality and really intellectual
dishonesty being practiced by San bolito
and the others Sam Alito who who of
course got caught up over the summer in
the ethics Scandal it's not just
Clarence Thomas taking millions of
dollars of vacations with right-wing
extremists and Nazi memorabilia
collectors like uh the heir of the
travel Crow fortune and not disclosing
it or selling his property including his
family Homestead another vacation
property to other right-wing Maga people
who have business in front of the Court
San Molino did it too he's taken Alaskan
you know going up being you know
glamping luxury camping trips in uh in
Fishing lodges that the average person
would never be able to afford paid for
it by you know the founders of the
Federalist Society you know he's dying
in private homes with people on the
right-wing Christian right who have
business in front of the court without
disclosing it it so it's of course Sam
Alito is hurt by it but don't forget who
Sam Alito is he's also the one that
probably leaked through his office the
Dobbs decision when it was in draft form
in order to ensure that it would be uh
voted in past in in past right taking
away a constitutional right for a woman
to choose in a bodily autonomy that
Dom's decision not Sam malito and good
on Chris Murphy and Sheldon Whitehouse
for taking on the U.S Supreme Court
because if they don't do it who's going
to you see the you see the
megalomaniacal approach by the U.S
Supreme Court we're above it all
really you were just human beings when
you were being confirmed and begging for
the job saying anything that would get
you through the confirmation process
even things that we now know were untrue
about your respect for precedent
we know you lied your way most of you
lied your way through
the confirmation hearings that you each
had Clarence Thomas We Know What You Did
related to your prior sex harassment and
discrimination allegations and Anita
Hill we'll leave that aside for a minute
the rest of you lied about what you
would do if you ever faced with a
challenge to Roe v Wade
and so and you've got a lifetime
appointment
and then you're telling me we also can't
regulate you we can't make what you do
transparent we can't mandate how you're
going to be
um disqualified that is what Senate Bill
359 does Sheldon White House's bill
that's what we're talking about right
that is the Supreme Court ethics recusal
and transparency act and as a side note
as a side note to Chris Murphy Senator
Murphy you just heard from he has
literally introduced every year for the
last 10 years a similar Bill to add a
code of conduct to the U.S Supreme Court
and its justices it's gotten shot down
every time whether whether Democrats
were in control or Republicans are in
control there's Chris Murphy you know
offering that bill but now with all the
spotlight for all of the
um conflicts of interests and financial
entanglement that we've seen primarily
on the right-wing Maga Supreme Court
it's time for the Senate to pass Senate
Bill 359. the Democrats have the votes
they have the president waiting to sign
it and it needs to be done and people
like Sam Alito need to take their big
noses and get it out of politics and
lobbying you know you don't see John
Roberts doing that John Roberts refused
to appear in front of the senate
committee because he said it would be
political and there's a separate nation
of powers San molito said well I've
given a four-hour interview with a Wall
Street Journal I'll say whatever I want
right and as soon as Sheldon White House
pulls you in with a subpoena to the
senate committee and Chris Murphy joins
you're going to say I can't make it
right Sam
is that right
you're going to say you're not available
separation of powers wouldn't be
appropriate
then it's not appropriate for you to get
on and interview with the Wall Street
Journal and have you attack Congress and
they're what they're only trying to do
for the American people which is to have
a out of control Supreme Court a rogue
Supreme Court reigned in and subject to
the exact same code of ethics and code
of conduct that house members senators
and every other judge in America state
or federal is subject to that's all we
want
Supreme Court and you're and I'm sorry
that you think you're above it all in
your Ivory Tower
but if you want to start rebuilding any
level of credibility with the American
people that that branch of government
literally has none at this point this
would be a good starting place don't
give interviews to attack s 359 the bill
and the Senate support it and Justice
Roberts you lead you be the moral leader
do that too we'll continue to keep your
feet to the fire here on hot digs just
like this one only on the Midas touch
Network that's where me Michael popock
that's where all that's where I do all
my work at the intersection of Law and
politics watch us on legal AF every
Wednesday and Saturday because we pull
all this together these kind of Stories
We curate them at the intersection of
U.S law and politics follow me on all
things social media at Ms poke this is
Michael popock legal AF reporting
by Michael Popok
MeidasTouch
Aug 5, 2023
Michael Popok of Legal AF reports on the battle brewing between Supreme Court Justice Sam Alito and Senator democrats, as Alito tells the Wall Street Journal that Congress is powerless to impose a code of ethics and conduct on the Supreme Court, and Senator Murphy fires back on national television.
Transcript
go to something that you and your
Democratic colleagues are working on in
the Senate and that is a code of conduct
for the Supreme Court I mean this is
something you introduce regularly but we
did get a response this week from
Supreme Court Justice Samuel lolito and
he said quote I know this is a
controversial view but I'm willing to
say it no provision in the Constitution
gives them meaning Congress the
authority to regulate the Supreme Court
period what do you think he is saying
there and what is your response
first of all it's just stunningly wrong
and and he
um should know that more than anyone
else because his seat on the Supreme
Court exists only because of an Act
passed by Congress it is Congress that
establishes the number of justices on
the Supreme Court it is Congress that
has passed in the past requirements for
justices to disclose certain information
and so it is just wrong on the facts to
say that Congress doesn't have anything
to do with the rules guiding the Supreme
Court in fact from the very beginning
Congress has set those rules but it is
even more disturbing that Alito feels
the need to insert himself into a
congressional debate and it is just more
evidence that these justices on the
Supreme Court these conservative
justices just see themselves as
politicians they just see themselves as
a second legislative body that has just
as much power and right to impose their
political will on the country as
Congress does they're going to bend the
law in order to impose their right-wing
view of how the country should work on
the rest of us and it's why we need to
pass this Common Sense ethics
legislation to at least make sure we
know that these guys aren't in bed
having their Lifestyles paid for by
conservative donors as we have
unfortunately seen uh in these latest
Revelations
this is Michael popock legally AF that
video sets up the Battle Royale between
the Supreme Court Sam Alito and the
Senate Democrats over whether we are
finally once and for all going to have a
U.S Supreme Court that adheres to a code
of conduct a code of ethics mandatory
disqualification the disclosure of
Financial
inter-relationships and entanglements
between parties before the court and
judges sitting up on that bench are we
going to have that or are we not are we
a country of law or of men which is it
it can't be both and this constant
ridiculous struggle where the Supreme
Court says we're we're above ethics
we're above codes of responsibility
really I mean last I looked you were
people human beings that put on your
pants one at a time and you're given the
highest honor in the the country
being confirmed to be one of nine U.S
Supreme Court Justices for a lifetime
appointment you don't think that comes
along with responsibility
certainly Chris Murphy does and Chris
Murphy's just schooled judge Alito and
told him I don't know what you're
talking about it is that he's
flabbergasted by two things one the fact
that Alito who's supposed to be part of
the judicial branch has intervened in
the world of politics and is effectively
lobbying Congress and getting in the
middle of the legislative branch
separation of powers co-equal branches
occupying their own spheres you're not
supposed to color outside the lines and
do it so blatantly and transparently
it's the only thing transparent about
San molito is his transparent lobbying
politically because he's trying to tell
his bosses in Congress because they are
and Chris Murphy just told them why
um that he's above the law that he's a
below he's above ethics and he's above
transparency when it comes to his
financial entanglements with right wing
people
so you saw how we got there that was
Chris Murphy today on or a Sunday
morning talk show responding to Sam
Alito but the Wall Street Journal
article was from a couple of days ago
and that article written by uh Paul
Rifkin and James tarante is entitled
Samuel Alito the Supreme Court's a plane
spoken Defender that was the title of
the article and buried in the article
which was a four-hour interview that Sam
Leto gave it was like a very fawning
puff piece put out by the Wall Street
Journal four hours calling Sam Alito at
one point and important Justice with a
distinctive uh stop interpretive style
that's one way of putting it but during
that interview he said and I quote and
you can hear it in Chris Murphy's video
that I played that uh he says I know
this is a controversial thing to say but
Congress nowhere in the Constitution no
there's no provision of the Constitution
that gives Congress the authority to
regulate the Supreme Court period
meaning back off you don't have the
right or the ability to impose a code of
conduct or code of ethics on the Supreme
Court and you heard Chris Murphy said
what are you talking about it is
Congress
it is congress's Power by which Sam
Alito and the others their seat even
exists right that was an act of Congress
it's an act of Congress that sets the
number of Supreme Court Justices its
Congress that passed and imposes a
financial disclosure obligations on the
Supreme Court and it's Congress that
controls the purse string all the money
that John Roberts is spending as the
head of the of the Judiciary the
judicial branch for all of its court
system and Court personnel and judges
and clerks and courthouses you ever seen
some of these courthouses these
Limestone buildings running three four
five eight hundred million dollars a
piece in cities that has to be approved
through Congress okay they don't have
their own slush fund not that I'm aware
of to pay for that so to say that
Congress has to back out and not have
oversight over a branch for which they
fund
right just shows you the depth of
immorality and really intellectual
dishonesty being practiced by San bolito
and the others Sam Alito who who of
course got caught up over the summer in
the ethics Scandal it's not just
Clarence Thomas taking millions of
dollars of vacations with right-wing
extremists and Nazi memorabilia
collectors like uh the heir of the
travel Crow fortune and not disclosing
it or selling his property including his
family Homestead another vacation
property to other right-wing Maga people
who have business in front of the Court
San Molino did it too he's taken Alaskan
you know going up being you know
glamping luxury camping trips in uh in
Fishing lodges that the average person
would never be able to afford paid for
it by you know the founders of the
Federalist Society you know he's dying
in private homes with people on the
right-wing Christian right who have
business in front of the court without
disclosing it it so it's of course Sam
Alito is hurt by it but don't forget who
Sam Alito is he's also the one that
probably leaked through his office the
Dobbs decision when it was in draft form
in order to ensure that it would be uh
voted in past in in past right taking
away a constitutional right for a woman
to choose in a bodily autonomy that
Dom's decision not Sam malito and good
on Chris Murphy and Sheldon Whitehouse
for taking on the U.S Supreme Court
because if they don't do it who's going
to you see the you see the
megalomaniacal approach by the U.S
Supreme Court we're above it all
really you were just human beings when
you were being confirmed and begging for
the job saying anything that would get
you through the confirmation process
even things that we now know were untrue
about your respect for precedent
we know you lied your way most of you
lied your way through
the confirmation hearings that you each
had Clarence Thomas We Know What You Did
related to your prior sex harassment and
discrimination allegations and Anita
Hill we'll leave that aside for a minute
the rest of you lied about what you
would do if you ever faced with a
challenge to Roe v Wade
and so and you've got a lifetime
appointment
and then you're telling me we also can't
regulate you we can't make what you do
transparent we can't mandate how you're
going to be
um disqualified that is what Senate Bill
359 does Sheldon White House's bill
that's what we're talking about right
that is the Supreme Court ethics recusal
and transparency act and as a side note
as a side note to Chris Murphy Senator
Murphy you just heard from he has
literally introduced every year for the
last 10 years a similar Bill to add a
code of conduct to the U.S Supreme Court
and its justices it's gotten shot down
every time whether whether Democrats
were in control or Republicans are in
control there's Chris Murphy you know
offering that bill but now with all the
spotlight for all of the
um conflicts of interests and financial
entanglement that we've seen primarily
on the right-wing Maga Supreme Court
it's time for the Senate to pass Senate
Bill 359. the Democrats have the votes
they have the president waiting to sign
it and it needs to be done and people
like Sam Alito need to take their big
noses and get it out of politics and
lobbying you know you don't see John
Roberts doing that John Roberts refused
to appear in front of the senate
committee because he said it would be
political and there's a separate nation
of powers San molito said well I've
given a four-hour interview with a Wall
Street Journal I'll say whatever I want
right and as soon as Sheldon White House
pulls you in with a subpoena to the
senate committee and Chris Murphy joins
you're going to say I can't make it
right Sam
is that right
you're going to say you're not available
separation of powers wouldn't be
appropriate
then it's not appropriate for you to get
on and interview with the Wall Street
Journal and have you attack Congress and
they're what they're only trying to do
for the American people which is to have
a out of control Supreme Court a rogue
Supreme Court reigned in and subject to
the exact same code of ethics and code
of conduct that house members senators
and every other judge in America state
or federal is subject to that's all we
want
Supreme Court and you're and I'm sorry
that you think you're above it all in
your Ivory Tower
but if you want to start rebuilding any
level of credibility with the American
people that that branch of government
literally has none at this point this
would be a good starting place don't
give interviews to attack s 359 the bill
and the Senate support it and Justice
Roberts you lead you be the moral leader
do that too we'll continue to keep your
feet to the fire here on hot digs just
like this one only on the Midas touch
Network that's where me Michael popock
that's where all that's where I do all
my work at the intersection of Law and
politics watch us on legal AF every
Wednesday and Saturday because we pull
all this together these kind of Stories
We curate them at the intersection of
U.S law and politics follow me on all
things social media at Ms poke this is
Michael popock legal AF reporting
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Re: Clarence Thomas’s Billionaire Benefactor Collects Hitler
by admin » Sat Aug 12, 2023 10:43 pm
Florida schools will begin using Clarence Thomas as an example of a black man who developed great wealth and social standing as a result of being owned by rich white men.
-- Charles Carreon, 8/11/23
********************
DeSantis doubles down on claim that some Blacks benefited from slavery: GOP presidential candidate draws renewed criticism after suggesting slavery helped African Americans develop skills such as being a blacksmith
by Kevin Sullivan and Lori Rozsa
Washington Post
July 22, 2023 at 5:32 p.m. EDT
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Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is intensifying his efforts to de-emphasize racism in his state’s public school curriculum by arguing that some Black people benefited from being enslaved and defending his state’s new African American history standards that civil rights leaders and scholars say misrepresents centuries of U.S. reality.
“They’re probably going to show that some of the folks that eventually parlayed, you know, being a blacksmith into doing things later in life,” DeSantis said on Friday in response to reporters’ questions while standing in front of a nearly all-White crowd of supporters.
DeSantis, a GOP presidential candidate who is lagging in polls against the front-runner, former president Donald Trump, and is trying to reset his campaign, quickly drew criticism from educators and even some in his party. He has built his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination on attacking what he calls the radical liberal policies of President Biden and the Democratic Party, but the latest remarks could alienate Black voters just as the GOP tries to court them.
Former U.S. Rep. Will Hurd of Texas, who announced last month that he was joining the race for the GOP nomination, blasted the idea that enslaved people were able to use slavery as some kind of training program.
“Slavery wasn’t a jobs program that taught beneficial skills,” Hurd, the son of a Black father and a White mother, tweeted. “It was literally dehumanizing and subjugated people as property because they lacked any rights or freedoms.”
DeSantis, however, is continuing to defend Florida’s new curriculum, which covers a broad range of topics and includes the assertion for middle school instruction that “slaves developed skills which, in some instances, could be applied for their personal benefit.”
DeSantis said he “wasn’t involved” in writing the new teaching materials, which took effect this week. But he credited “a lot of scholars” with creating “the most robust standards in African American history probably anywhere in the country.”
Civil rights leaders, educators and others have expressed revulsion at the idea that enslaved people benefited from the experience.
As Biden’s running mate, Vice President Harris has stepped up her attack-dog role, and on Friday traveled to Jacksonville to assail DeSantis’s policies in his home state. She emphasized that slavery involved rape, torture and “some of the worst examples of depriving people of humanity in our world.”
Florida State Rep. Fentrice Driskell, a Tampa Democrat who last year became the first Black woman to become House Democratic Leader, called DeSantis’s latest remarks a continuation of DeSantis’s “assault on Black history.”
“Let’s really dissect what he’s saying here,” she said. “He’s saying that to be ripped away from your homelands and brought to another country against your will, or to be born into the atrocity of the dehumanizing institution that was slavery, that those horrors are some way somehow outweighed by the benefit that you get a trade. Are you kidding me?”
DeSantis issued a statement Friday saying, “Democrats like Kamala Harris have to lie about Florida’s educational standards to cover for their agenda of indoctrinating students and pushing sexual topics onto children.” His campaign did not respond to an email on Saturday requesting comment.
Some on the right defended DeSantis, including Fox News host Jesse Watters.
“No one is arguing slaves benefited from slavery,” Watters said Friday on his prime time show. “No one is saying that. It’s not true. They are teaching how Black people develop skills during slavery in some instances that can be applied for their own personal benefit.”
Biden campaign co-chairman Cedric L. Richmond attacked DeSantis’s defense of the new Florida curriculum as “disgusting.” He added in a statement on Saturday that it was “a symptom of the extremism that’s infected the Republican candidates running for president. There’s no debate over slavery. It was utterly evil with zero redeeming qualities.”
Marvin Dunn, a professor emeritus at Florida International University and author of “A History of Florida: Through Black Eyes,” said DeSantis would gain no political advantage from his argument because “it is so outrageous that people are going to reject it.”
“These children know in their hearts and in their minds that slavery was evil,” he said.
“One of the main things about slavery, beyond the physical damage that it did to people of so many generations, was that it prevented people from becoming what they could have become,” he said.
“So what if you became a carpenter or a blacksmith or a good maid? Your chances of that were not determined by you, it was determined by somebody else. That’s not a rationalization for enslavement.”
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