{"id":269212,"date":"2024-07-15T12:01:52","date_gmt":"2024-07-15T11:01:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=269212"},"modified":"2024-07-12T06:58:30","modified_gmt":"2024-07-12T05:58:30","slug":"aoc-files-to-impeach-supreme-court-justices-clarence-thomas-samuel-alito","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2024\/07\/aoc-files-to-impeach-supreme-court-justices-clarence-thomas-samuel-alito\/","title":{"rendered":"AOC Files to Impeach Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez @ Women\u2019s March NYC.
Dimitri Rodriguez, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons<\/p><\/div>\n

11 Jul 2024 <\/em>– Yesterday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-New York) filed articles of impeachment against Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, in the boldest move yet to resolve the Court\u2019s \u201cunchecked corruption crisis\u201d as it radically reshapes the U.S. government in the image of the conservative justices\u2019 right-wing allies.<\/p>\n

Ocasio-Cortez said that the two justices\u2019 transgressions represent \u201cone of the clearest cases for which the tool of impeachment was designed\u201d and must be reined in for the sake of U.S. democracy.<\/p>\n

\u201cJustice Thomas and Alito\u2019s repeated failure over decades to disclose that they received millions of dollars in gifts from individuals with business before the court is explicitly against the law. And their refusal to recuse from the specific matters and cases before the court in which their benefactors and spouses are implicated represents nothing less than a constitutional crisis,\u201d Ocasio-Cortez said\u00a0in a statement<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese failures alone would amount to a deep transgression worthy of standard removal in any lower court, and would disqualify any nominee to the highest court from confirmation in the first place,\u201d she continued. \u201cCongress has a legal, moral, and democratic obligation to impeach.\u201d<\/p>\n

The lawmaker filed three articles against Thomas and two against Alito, levying charges against both of refusing to recuse from cases that represented conflicts of interest for the justices as well as failing to disclose gifts they have received from special interest donors over their decades on the bench.<\/p>\n

Ocsaio-Cortez\u2019s impeachment articles are cosponsored by eight House members, including Representatives Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan), Ilhan Omar (D-Minnesota) and Jamaal Bowman (D-New York). They are also endorsed by several court watchdog and progressive groups.<\/p>\n

Recent reports have revealed that Thomas and Alito have\u00a0received millions of dollars\u2019 worth<\/a>\u00a0of gifts while on the bench that they either failed to disclose or, many argue, should never have accepted to begin with in accordance with ethics standards. The extent of the justices\u2019 largesse from conservative donors grows each time it\u2019s scrutinized,\u00a0especially in the case of<\/a>\u00a0Thomas, who has received more gifts than every other justice combined in his time on the bench.<\/p>\n

In combination with the Supreme Court\u2019s\u00a0string of<\/a>\u00a0far right rulings<\/a>\u00a0in recent years \u2014 and\u00a0ties<\/a>\u00a0that justices have maintained to groups supporting arguments in the Court \u2014 the revelations have made clear a deep level of corruption at the nation\u2019s top court at a time when it seeks to concentrate more and more power in itself.<\/p>\n

The Republican-dominated House is unlikely to vote to impeach the justices. However, the filing is a show of the urgency of the legitimacy crisis that the Supreme Court is facing as the justices apparently seek to\u00a0legislate from the bench<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Democrats in the Senate are also seeking accountability for Thomas. On Tuesday, Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Federal Courts Chair Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) and Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (D-Oregon)\u00a0sent a letter<\/a>\u00a0urging the Department of Justice to open a criminal investigation into Thomas and his benefactors for potential ethics breaches, false statements and tax fraud.<\/p>\n

The lawmakers laid out a mountain of evidence of Thomas\u2019s misdoings, saying that the fact that Thomas has received so many gifts over such a long period of time \u2014 and the fact that lawmakers and reporters are seemingly constantly uncovering new undisclosed gifts \u2014 could warrant the appointment of a special counsel to conduct the probe.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence assembled thus far plainly suggests that Justice Thomas has committed numerous willful violations of federal ethics and false-statement laws and raises significant questions about whether he and his wealthy benefactors have complied with their federal tax obligations,\u201d the lawmakers wrote. \u201cPresented with opportunities to resolve questions about his conduct, Justice Thomas has maintained a suspicious silence.\u201d<\/p>\n

__________________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em>Sharon Zhang is a news writer covering politics, climate and labor. She wrote for <\/em>Pacific Standard,\u00a0The New Republic, and more. Sharon has a master\u2019s degree in environmental studies.<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original – scheerpost.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

11 Jul 2024 – Yesterday, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez filed articles of impeachment against the two supreme court justices in the boldest move yet to resolve the court\u2019s \u201cunchecked corruption crisis\u201d as it radically reshapes the U.S. government for worse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":269214,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[65],"tags":[3344,542,2287,651,1639,70],"class_list":["post-269212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-anglo-america","tag-alexandria-ocasio-cortez","tag-fascism","tag-impeachment","tag-justice","tag-right-politics","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269212"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":269217,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269212\/revisions\/269217"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/269214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}