Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas announced that Republican billionaire Harlan Crow has paid for his private flights and meals on three trips in 2022, according to financial disclosure forms released Thursday.
In his 2022 financial disclosure form, Thomas said Crow flew him home from Dallas in February after giving a keynote address at the American Enterprise Institute conference in Crow’s Old Parkland property because of an “unexpected ice storm.”
In May, Crow arranged flights to Thomas on his private jet because of the “heightened security risk” after a copy of the Dobbs abortion decree was leaked. Thomas was again featured at the American Enterprise Institute conference in Old Parkland, Texas.
A third July trip funded by Crow was to Keese Mill, New York, the town adjacent to Crow’s private resort in the Adirondacks, Camp Topridge.
Thomas also disclosed details of a 2014 real estate deal with Crow in the new forms, but said he was not accepting gifts in 2022.
Conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas (left) announced that Republican billionaire Harlan Crow (right) paid for a trio of his private flights in financial disclosure forms released Thursday
In April, ProPublica bankrupt Thomas for 20 years of jet-setting with Crow, none of which was mentioned on previous financial disclosure forms.
Thomas vacationed on Crow’s superyacht and flew on Crow’s Bombardier Global 5000 jet.
Thomas went with Crow to Bohemian Grove, a male-only resort in California.
Thomas spent time at Crow’s ranch in East Texas.
And he spent a week each summer at Crow’s private resort in New York’s Adirondacks, Camp Topridge, ProPublica reported.
Rates for a nearby hotel start at $2,250 per night, but Camp Topridge is even more exclusive, requiring guests to be personally invited by Crow.
It also has quirky features, including a replica of Hagrid from Harry Potter’s cabin, a 1950s-style soda fountain and bronze statues of leprechauns.
A 2019 trip Thomas and his wife Ginni took to Indonesia with Crow — which included private flights and time aboard the yacht, dubbed the Michaela Rose and equipped with a giant inflatable rubber duck — would have cost about $500,000, the news organization said. .
Thomas’s annual salary is $285,000.
Another guest on the trip, Trump official Mark Paoletta, who was then general counsel to the Office of Management and Budget, told ProPublica that he discussed the trip with an ethics attorney.
“Based on that counsel’s advice, I reimbursed Harlan for expenses,” Paoletta said.
He never answered a follow-up question about how much he paid.
ProPublica reported that Thomas had also been on the yacht during a trip to New Zealand and around Savannah, Georgia.
The news organization also found photos of the Justice Department wearing a shirt with the Michaela Rose logo reading “March 2007” and “Greek Islands,” suggesting that Thomas was also traveling at the time.
None of them were announced.
A law passed after Watergate requires judges, judges, members of Congress and federal officials to disclose most gifts.
Ethics experts in ProPublica said in an interview that Thomas should have made the private flights and hunting trips public.
Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse displays a painting of Clarence Thomas (second from right) and Harlan Crow (right), gathered at Crow’s Adirondacks resort, Camp Topridge. The painting is on display in the New York building
Virginia Canter, a former government ethics attorney and now a member of the Washington watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, said Thomas “appears to have completely ignored his higher ethical obligations.”
“If a judge’s lifestyle is subsidized by the rich and famous, it definitely erodes public confidence,” Canter told ProPublica. “Frankly, it makes me despondent.”
In a statement in response to the story, Crow acknowledged that he had extended “hospitality” to the Thomases “over the years”, but added that justice had never called for it and “that it was no different from the hospitality that we have commanded our many’. other dear friends.’
ProPublica also reported that Crow paid about $100,000 in tuition for Thomas’ second cousin, who was raised like a son by justice, to attend Hidden Lake Academy and Randolph-Macon Academy, a military school where the billionaire also had seated.
Just days after ProPublica’s first report on Crow funding Thomas’ vacations, the news outlet ran a story saying the billionaire bought the house where Thomas’ mother lived, along with two other properties on her block that had been owned by the Justice Department.
The new disclosure form says that in 1984, Thomas inherited one-third of the trio of properties, his mother’s residence and two additional homes in Savannah, Georgia.
In 2014, it says, Crow, “an old friend of Filer and his wife,” purchased the homes for $133,000, along with other homes and lots on the street.
“Filer and his wife had invested between $50,000 and $75,000 over the years in his mother’s home in capital improvements, and therefore the transaction amounted to a capital loss,” the disclosure form read.
Thomas said he disclosed rental income from the two properties, not his mother’s home, when they had tenants.
“When these properties ceased to generate rental income, the petitioner was advised by committee staff to remove the two properties from his disclosure forms,” he wrote.
“However, the petitioner inadvertently realized that the ‘sale transaction’ for the final sale of the three properties in 2014 resulted in a new reportable transaction, even though this sale resulted in a loss of capital,” he said.