Why Justice Alito’s secretive phone call with Trump is ‘troubling’ before his hush money sentencing

Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito is drawing criticism after revealing he spoke with President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday.

Their call came a day before Trump’s lawyers made a last-ditch effort to have the nation’s highest court halt the sentencing in his hush-money case.

The conservative judge said he spoke by phone with the newly elected president on Tuesday to recommend a former law clerk for a job.

“William Levi, one of my former law clerks, asked me to take a call from President-elect Trump regarding his qualifications to serve in government office,” Alito said in a statement.

“I agreed to discuss this matter with President-elect Trump, and he called me yesterday afternoon,” Alito continued.

Alito’s statement was released after the call was first reported by ABC News.

“We also did not discuss any other matter that is pending or could come before the Supreme Court in the future, or previous Supreme Court decisions involving the President-elect,” Alito said.

Sentencing in Trump’s hush money case is scheduled for Friday, January 10, but the president-elect has tried to have the case dismissed.

Trump, 78, was found guilty last May of 34 charges of falsifying company records to cover up hush money payments made to keep Stormy Daniels quiet about an alleged affair before the 2016 election.

Trump’s team successfully postponed the sentencing until after the November election, but Judge Juan Merchan denied his efforts to have the sentencing paused and scheduled it just days before his inauguration.

On Tuesday, an appeals court also rejected the president-elect’s request to stay the sentencing, so his team turned to the Supreme Court.

But the call between Alito and Trump comes as Supreme Court justices have come under intense scrutiny in recent years for actions that critics have labeled unethical or at least given the appearance of impropriety.

Trump pictured with Alito at the White House in July 2019. Alito claimed their call Tuesday was about a recommendation for a former law clerk for a position and that they had not discussed pending cases in court.

Gabe Roth, executive director of Fix the Court, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for a more open and accountable justice system, dismissed Tuesday’s call.

“President-elect Trump, Judge Alito and Will Levi – who has been chief counsel to the Senate Judiciary and a top counsel to the DOJ, and is the son of a federal judge and grandson of an attorney general – should know better he wrote in an email to DailyMail.com.

“But they don’t care because they know no one in Congress or the judiciary will hold them accountable for ethics violations. If anything, this kind of violation of protocol is a badge of honor in the Trump sphere,” Roth added.

He argued that the call was “just an excuse” for the president-elect to speak to one of the nine judges who will decide the fate of the hush money case and review other Trump-related cases over the next four years.

“Trump and Alito tend to be better at hiding their ethical issues, at least for a few months or sometimes longer,” Roth said. “But with the Supreme Court greenlighting near-absolute presidential immunity last year, and with Congress refusing to adopt enforceable ethics for the justices, it seems there’s no reason to even try.”

President-elect Trump in Manhattan criminal court in April. He was found guilty of 34 charges of falsifying company records, but sentencing has been postponed. His lawyers asked the Supreme Court on Wednesday to halt the sentencing scheduled for Friday

He wasn’t the only one who found the call between Trump and Alito disturbing.

“You have to understand that Alito is in a neck-and-neck competition with Clarence Thomas and Aileen Cannon over who is the most corrupt and disgraceful lawyer,” Norman Ornstein, senior fellow emeritus at the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute, said. in one after.

“This was a bold move that put Alito ahead. For now,” he added.

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) branded Alito “blatantly insolent” after the call was confirmed following reports.

“Judge Alito has made impropriety the norm,” Blumenthal wrote on The Court’s current supposed ethical standards are an unenforceable sham.”

Alito came under fire last year after it was reported that an upside-down American flag flew outside his home in January 2021.

He claimed the flag was raised by his wife in response to an argument with neighbors, but the timing raised alarm because an upside-down flag was a symbol for Trump supporters falsely claiming fraud in the 2020 election.

Democrats in Congress demanded that he recuse himself from any matters related to election interference and the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol, but Alito rejected those calls.

Judge Clarence Thomas has also come under fire in recent years for failing to report luxury trips paid for by billionaires.

In November 2023, the Supreme Court announced that judges will adhere to a new code of conduct in an effort to address ethical concerns, but the move and lack of enforcement action have done little to stem the tide of criticism of the nation’s highest court .