Clarence Thomas confronted with new investigation request

Two Democratic U.S. senators are calling on Attorney General Merrick Garland to help launch an investigation into alleged ethics violations by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Thomas, the court’s longest-serving member and part of its conservative majority, has long been under fire, including allegations that he failed to disclose several expensive gifts from Republican billionaire Harlan Crow and never paid taxes on a forgiven loan of more than $267,000 from another wealthy business owner.

On Tuesday, Senators Sheldon Whitehouse and Ron Wyden announced in a press release that they had sent Garland a letter urging him to appoint a special counsel to investigate Thomas’ alleged violations. Previous investigations into Thomas were led by Whitehouse and Wyden as chairmen of the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts and the Senate Finance Committee, respectively.

“We do not make this request lightly,” Whitehouse and Wyden wrote in the letter, sent July 3. “The evidence gathered to date clearly indicates that Judge Thomas has committed numerous willful violations of federal ethics and false statements laws, and there are significant doubts about whether he and his wealthy benefactors have complied with their federal tax obligations.”

“Judge Thomas has remained suspiciously silent despite the opportunity to clarify questions about his conduct,” they continue. “No government official should be above the law… We therefore urge you to appoint a special prosecutor with the authority to investigate any possible criminal offenses by Judge Thomas.”

Newsweek reached out to the Justice Department via an online press contact form and to a Supreme Court spokesperson via email for comment on Tuesday evening.

The senators argued in their letter that “appointing a special counsel would serve the public interest” and stressed that the “extent” of evidence against Thomas “justifies a criminal investigation.” They also said that the “full extent of Judge Thomas’s secrecy” is “still unknown.”

Controversy erupted after ProPublica published a report in April 2023 detailing a series of undeclared “luxury trips” that Thomas accepted from Crow over a period of many years. The nonprofit news organization noted in the report that “the magnitude and frequency of Crow’s apparent gifts to Thomas have no known precedent in the modern history of the U.S. Supreme Court.”

Crow defended the gifts to Thomas and his wife as examples of “hospitality” extended to “dear friends.” Thomas also denied any wrongdoing, insisting in a statement that the gifts were “not reportable” and that he had sought “advice” before accepting them.

“Early in my tenure on the Court, I sought advice from my colleagues and other justices and was advised that this type of personal hospitality from close friends who had no connection with the Court was not reportable,” Thomas said. “I have endeavored to follow that advice throughout my tenure and have always tried to comply with disclosure guidelines.”