Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Sunday condemned conservative Supreme Court justices for accepting and not disclosing gifts received from wealthy, right-wing donors, as more revelations continue to come to light about how justices take advantage of their powerful position.
In a letter to Senate Democrats, Schumer said Americans’ faith in the justice system has reached a record low “after the extreme MAGA right captured the Supreme Court and achieved dangerous, regressive policies completely at odds with what the vast majority of Americans want.”
Unpopular decisions include tossing President Joe Biden’s plan on student loan forgiveness, ending affirmative action in college admissions decisions and last year’s ruling reversing the decades-old precedent that protected abortion rights.
But while the court has been chipping away at Americans’ rights, Schumer said, conservative justices have continued to enjoy benefits attached to their presence on the court.
“This MAGA-captured Supreme Court feels free to accept lavish gifts and vacations from their powerful, billionaire friends,” Schumer wrote. “And these are no ordinary billionaires — they are ideological extremists who bankroll hard-right MAGA causes and then bring those cases before the same Justices they’ve patronized.”
Schumer’s letter comes on the same day that The New York Times reported that Justice Clarence Thomas, as a member of the Horatio Alger Association of Distinguished Americans, joined a circle of “extraordinarily wealthy, largely conservative members” receiving special treatment, and in return gave them rare access to the court, including hosting an induction ceremony for new joiners inside the courtroom.
Earlier this year, ProPublica reported that Thomas accepted luxury vacations from conservative donor Harlan Crow, who also made a real estate deal that benefited Thomas’ family and paid private school tuition for the justice’s grandnephew.
But Thomas is not the only member of the court to come under scrutiny.
Justice Samuel Alito accepted a luxury fishing vacation in 2008 from hedge fund billionaire Paul Singer, who appeared before the high court in at least 10 business disputes, ProPublica revealed last month. In that case, Alito offered a rebuttal in The Wall Street Journal before that piece was even published.
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) on Sunday called on Chief Justice John Roberts to testify before Congress over the ethics rules governing members of the court, which Roberts has refused to do so far.
“My plea to him would be, for the good of democracy, come testify,” Khanna, who has come out in support of term limits for justices, told MSNBC’s “Inside With Jen Psaki.” “What are you afraid of?”
In his letter, Schumer added that Democrats’ priorities include confirming Biden’s judicial nominees “to rebalance the federal bench with judges who respect the rule of law.”
“Congress has clear authority to oversee the federal judiciary, and we must explore every option for restoring faith in our courts,” he wrote.