The Senate Judiciary Committee considered Supreme Court ethics reform legislation Thursday, passing the bill in committee on a party-line vote. The legislation is bitterly opposed by Republicans even though it simply requires the Supreme Court to abide by the same ethics restrictions that every other federal judge—and all elected officials—have to live by. Republicans on the panel were so worked up about this you’d have thought the committee was considering impeaching all of the conservative justices rather than saying that they should probably disclose when a super-wealthy friend takes them around the world for free on his luxury yacht.
Republicans threatened dozens of amendments, though they ended up offering only a handful. These ranged from Sen. Thomas Kennedy’s effort to make all the Democrats look like racists by inserting a passage that condemns racist language against Justice Clarence Thomas (and only Thomas) to Sen. John Cornyn’s amendment to allow all federal judges to carry firearms to protect themselves. They gave up after only having a handful considered, to the relief of everyone. The Republicans were predictably shrill in defending the indefensible and hypocritical and in doing so, proved that the court they’ve constructed is undeniably political.
The Republican senators defended the Supreme Court as “conservative” and derided the idea of making the court abide by the same ethics standards as everyone else, saying that would be “far left.” Their performance was as shameless as ever, particularly when it came to circling the wagons around Thomas. Their defense of Thomas was so impassioned that one could justifiably wonder if they were playing to an audience of one: Leonard Leo and his checkbook.
Speaking of the billionaire conservative Supreme Court fixer, The Washington Post has yet another story about the extremely well-funded industry created around Thomas to protect, deify, and entertain him, and to pad his already comfortable lifetime tenure on the court. The latest story is about a $1.8 million campaign (funded by Leo) that “would stretch on for years and include the creation and promotion of a laudatory film about Thomas, advertising to boost positive content about him during internet searches and publication of a book about his life.” The effort even included creation of a “Justice Thomas Fan Account” on Twitter, something that was never going to happen organically.
Republicans in Congress have joined the far right to invest a great deal in making sure that Thomas and his fellow conservatives are coddled, protected, and willing to continue the destruction of the social and political advances made in the U.S. since the middle of the 20th century. That was on full display in the Judiciary Committee hearing Thursday. The Republicans’ performance was as shameless as ever, full of straw man arguments and attempted gotcha poison pills, which just served to prove how partisan the court majority is.
That’s certainly the view of the American public in 2023. Just in time for this hearing, Quinnipiac University released a national poll Thursday showing that 70% of Americans think the justices are too influenced by politics, and 56% disapprove of their job performance.
At the same time, Navigator Research released focus group results showing that the majority of participants think the court “has too much power and is not representing the public well,” and “the Court is too conservative to the point that outcomes of cases are predictable prior to their decision.” When told about the recent reporting of potential ethics violations, “participants used far more negative words to describe the Court, including ‘corrupt,’ ‘brazen,’ and ‘infuriating.’”
Republicans are doing their best to put a negative spin on the unveiling of this corruption. They insist that ”far-left dark money” has financed these revelations in the media about the largesse being heaped upon conservative justices by the Leo network of billionaires. They’re not denying the truth of these stories: They’re expressing outrage that their Supreme Court justices are the subject of public scrutiny. Though the bill was passed in the committee, it’s not going to be passed by the full Senate. Republicans are going to filibuster it.
In his opening statement, Sen. Lindsey Graham said that the issue of Democrats trying to impose ethics on a resistant Supreme Court "will be on the 2024 ballot, I hope.” It will, Senator Graham. It will. But it’s not going to play out the way you hope.
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