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A conservative activist helped Ginni Thomas rake in nearly $100,000 for consulting, The Washington Post reported.
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Conservative lawyer Leonard Leo reportedly ensured Ginni Thomas’ name was kept off the paperwork.
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Leo’s nonprofit filed an amicus brief before the Supreme Court that same year.
A little more than a decade ago, a conservative judicial activist helped Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, secure consulting work that yielded her nearly $100,000 — all the while asking that her name was left off the financial paperwork, according to a new Washington Post report.
Leonard Leo, a lawyer and conservative legal activist, told then-GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill his nonprofit, Judicial Education Project, and give that money to Ginni Thomas in January 2012, the outlet reported, citing financial documents.
That very same year, Leo’s nonprofit filed an amicus brief to the Supreme Court in a key voting rights case in which a 5-4 majority — that included Thomas — ultimately opted to strike down a component of the Voting Rights Act.
The latest scandal comes amid a flood of judicial misconduct allegations against Thomas in recent weeks. A series of ProPublica reports alleged that the longest-serving justice sold his childhood home to GOP mega-donor Harlan Crow without disclosing the sale and accepted decades of expensive — and undisclosed — vacations from Crow.
Ginni Thomas has previously courted controversy with her public, pro-Trump activities, and other conservative activism.
The Post said documents show that Leo instructed Conway at the time to “give” Ginni Thomas “another $25K,” noting that the billing information should have “no mention of Ginni, of course.”
“When you funnel tens of thousands of dollars to the wife of a Supreme Court justice and go out of your way to specify that her name must be kept off all records of the transaction, that means you know you are doing something wrong,” Sarah Lipton-Lubet, president of the Supreme Court advocacy nonprofit Take Back the Court, said in a statement shared with Insider.
Neither Ginni Thomas, nor a representative for the Supreme Court immediately responded to Insider’s request for comment.
Previously, SCOTUS experts have said that a main issue is the lack of enforcement of ethics standards; justices are tasked with policing themselves.
This story is breaking. Please check back for updates.
Read the original article on Business Insider
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