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A recent report on ProPublica revealed that Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas accepted luxury gifts from GOP’s mega-donor Harlan Crow for twenty years but failed to disclose them in public filings, raising ethical questions stemming from the transactions.
President George Bush's appointee Clarence Thomas has served as a Supreme Court justice for over three decades since he was appointed in 1991. The report alleged that Justice Clarence Thomas, who earns $285,000 a year, vacationed in Texas Billionaire Harlan Crow’s yacht and used his private jets on luxury trips worth $500,000, every year for nearly two decades.
Harlan Crow, 74, is a conservative billionaire developer who made his fortune through real estate deals. Crow was born in Dallas to a wealthy father, Trammel Crow, a real estate giant who at one point owned most of the properties in the country. Harlan Crow is credited with rebuilding the family fortune after Trammell Crow lost his investments through bad deals.
As per the Wall Street Journal, in 2021, Harlan Crow, who boasts a 77-car underground garage worth $55m in his home, was constructing a privately built 228-foot bell tower in the U.S. that sat directly outside his office window in Dallas.
Twitter erupts with calls to impeach Clarence Thomas amid the recent revelations
The new ProPublica report alleged Clarence Thomas and his wife Ginni reportedly vacationed in numerous countries and stayed in properties owned by the conservative billionaire Crow for nearly two decades. The trips always included traveling on Crow's luxury yacht or private jet.
According to the report, while one of the trips was disclosed in a public filing in 1997, others were conveniently obscured in the documents.
The outlet, citing legal experts, said that the Judge’s failure to report hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of luxury trips seemingly violates an ethical law stemming from the Watergate scandal that requires public servants to disclose gifts.
The report also stated that Thomas attended several parties hosted by the billionaire on these vacations that also included other wealthy conservatives in attendance.
While Clarence Thomas is yet to release a statement on the recent revelations, Twitter flared up with calls to impeach the Supreme Court justice over his alleged shady dealings with the conservative Texas billionaire. Users commented saying:
In a statement to ProPublica, Crow said that the gifts were mere expressions of his 30-year friendship with the Judge and his wife and had no bearing on the Supreme Court Justice’s position. The statement read:
“Justice Thomas and Ginni never asked for any of this hospitality,” adding, he “never asked about a pending or lower court case, and Justice Thomas has never discussed one.”
As per CNN, the report revealing the connection between Thomas and conservative billionaire Harlan Crow comes amid growing demands from Congress that the Justices should disclose documents to prevent any ethical ambiguity.
