The American Prospect
•72% Informative
The Supreme Court released a document on Tuesday to correct the “misunderstanding” that the justices “regard themselves as unrestricted by any ethics rules.” The document sets out broad, affirmative standards of behavior, few of which are compulsory.
While both codes ban justices from leading, speaking, or donating to “political organizations” unlike the lower courts, the Supreme Court never defines that term.
David Gergen : Nothing appears to prevent a Supreme Court justice from simultaneously being an executive official of the Federalist Society , American Constitution Society , or any other legal organ of a political movement.
Gergen says the code simply doesn’t prohibit any of the actions that caused its creation in the first place.
He says it would be perfectly ethical for Thomas , Alito , and pals to direct funds and issue orders to their ideological compatriots from the highest bench in the land, so long as the forum through which they do so is not technically a political partyGergen: Influence peddling is rampant throughout the government, and it mainly happens through precisely this kind of winking, nodding,.
As toothless as the code is, Ginni Thomas’s political consulting career still might violate some of its provisions.
What else is anyone supposed to do? Maybe the only thing we can do for sure is vigorously resist the theatrics.
Conservative activists and white-shoe lawyers will surely push hard to treat this as the end of the story.
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