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Conservative Supreme Court Justices Are Showing Their Biases On Twitter Now
Conservative Supreme Court Justices Are Showing Their Biases On Twitter Now
If only the Supreme Court had ANY ETHICS RULES AT ALL.
By ELIE MYSTAL
at 12:12 PM
If the Supreme Court followed the basic rules of ethics applicable to every other court, Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh would have to recuse themselves from the Bostock, Altitude Express, and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes cases — the ones which seek to reinterpret Title VII to allow for bigotry against the LGBTQ community. Alito and Kavanaugh took some sort of meeting and even posed for a picture with the leader of a virulent anti-LGBT group, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM). Here’s the photo:
It’s really bad enough that conservative justices are so willing to give public aid and comfort to right-wing groups like the Federalist Society. Brett Kavanaugh, who has been credibly accused of attempted rape, has promised to take revenge on his enemies, so you can’t really claim the justice’s partisan hackery is surprising. But this meeting with the NOM is is outrageous. NOM has filed an amicus brief with the Court in the Bostock/Altitude/Funeral Homes cases. The Court has heard arguments and the justices are ostensibly working on their opinions in those cases RIGHT NOW. Taking meeting and a picture with people who have a case and argument pending in front of you would be unacceptable for any other court in the land.
But the Supreme Court operates under no ethics rules. John Roberts occasionally makes noises about issuing some, but he hasn’t. And I suspect the reason is that any reasonable rules would proscribe the behavior of his colleagues like Kavanaugh, Alito, and Clarence Thomas. Thomas, along with his wife Ginni, spend so much time promoting right-wing causes and groups that nearly any code of “ethics” would force Thomas to recuse himself from half of the Court’s docket.
And so NOM gets to have its little photo op and meeting with Alito and Kavanaugh who are mulling over the future of Title VII right now. You don’t have to wonder what NOM might have wanted to talk about. Again, they have a BRIEF BEFORE THE COURT right now:
{snip}
Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and a contributor at The Nation. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.
If only the Supreme Court had ANY ETHICS RULES AT ALL.
By ELIE MYSTAL
at 12:12 PM
If the Supreme Court followed the basic rules of ethics applicable to every other court, Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh would have to recuse themselves from the Bostock, Altitude Express, and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes cases — the ones which seek to reinterpret Title VII to allow for bigotry against the LGBTQ community. Alito and Kavanaugh took some sort of meeting and even posed for a picture with the leader of a virulent anti-LGBT group, the National Organization for Marriage (NOM). Here’s the photo:
Great day at US Supreme Court #SCOTUS with #CardinalMueller, Princess Gloria #ThurnundTaxis with Justices #SamuelAlito and #BrettKavanaugh
Link to tweet
It’s really bad enough that conservative justices are so willing to give public aid and comfort to right-wing groups like the Federalist Society. Brett Kavanaugh, who has been credibly accused of attempted rape, has promised to take revenge on his enemies, so you can’t really claim the justice’s partisan hackery is surprising. But this meeting with the NOM is is outrageous. NOM has filed an amicus brief with the Court in the Bostock/Altitude/Funeral Homes cases. The Court has heard arguments and the justices are ostensibly working on their opinions in those cases RIGHT NOW. Taking meeting and a picture with people who have a case and argument pending in front of you would be unacceptable for any other court in the land.
But the Supreme Court operates under no ethics rules. John Roberts occasionally makes noises about issuing some, but he hasn’t. And I suspect the reason is that any reasonable rules would proscribe the behavior of his colleagues like Kavanaugh, Alito, and Clarence Thomas. Thomas, along with his wife Ginni, spend so much time promoting right-wing causes and groups that nearly any code of “ethics” would force Thomas to recuse himself from half of the Court’s docket.
And so NOM gets to have its little photo op and meeting with Alito and Kavanaugh who are mulling over the future of Title VII right now. You don’t have to wonder what NOM might have wanted to talk about. Again, they have a BRIEF BEFORE THE COURT right now:
{snip}
Elie Mystal is the Executive Editor of Above the Law and a contributor at The Nation. He can be reached @ElieNYC on Twitter, or at elie@abovethelaw.com. He will resist.
7 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
Just imagine the stink from the right if Justices Kagan and Breyer were to have met with a group filing an amicus brief on the other side of this Title VII case, like the brief @JoshuaMatz8and I submitted on behalf of a number of scholars!
Link to tweet
What Were They Thinking? Justices Again Fail a Basic Ethics Test
OCTOBER 31, 2019
Fix the Court asks the justices to explain recent appearances with individuals, institutions who’ve submitted “friend of the court” briefs
Questions of ethics have reemerged at the Supreme Court this week as Fix the Court has learned that Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh met Tuesday with the head of a group that submitted an amicus brief for the term’s most highly contested, and still open, cases.
In response, FTC is asking the court either to withdraw the brief or issue a statement addressing why the justices may continue to sit on the cases given the standard in federal law that a “justice […] shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
This past spring the court agreed to hear Bostock v. Clayton County (17-1618), Altitude Express v. Zarda (17-1623) and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC (18-107) on whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employment discrimination against gay, lesbian and transgender people. On Aug. 22, the National Organization for Marriage submitted an amicus brief for all three cases in which the organization called the fired LGBT employees’ claims “a radical expansion of basic civil rights laws.”
Arguments took place on Oct. 8. This week, with the cases unresolved, NOM President Brian Brown (far right) met with Alito and Kavanaugh.
....
OCTOBER 31, 2019
Fix the Court asks the justices to explain recent appearances with individuals, institutions who’ve submitted “friend of the court” briefs
Questions of ethics have reemerged at the Supreme Court this week as Fix the Court has learned that Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh met Tuesday with the head of a group that submitted an amicus brief for the term’s most highly contested, and still open, cases.
In response, FTC is asking the court either to withdraw the brief or issue a statement addressing why the justices may continue to sit on the cases given the standard in federal law that a “justice […] shall disqualify himself in any proceeding in which his impartiality might reasonably be questioned.”
This past spring the court agreed to hear Bostock v. Clayton County (17-1618), Altitude Express v. Zarda (17-1623) and R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v. EEOC (18-107) on whether Title VII of the Civil Rights Act prohibits employment discrimination against gay, lesbian and transgender people. On Aug. 22, the National Organization for Marriage submitted an amicus brief for all three cases in which the organization called the fired LGBT employees’ claims “a radical expansion of basic civil rights laws.”
Arguments took place on Oct. 8. This week, with the cases unresolved, NOM President Brian Brown (far right) met with Alito and Kavanaugh.
“It’s ethical lapses like this that doom the public’s trust of the Supreme Court – and rightly so,” FTC’s Gabe Roth said. “How can the average American believe that the justices will render an impartial decision when at least two of the nine are meeting with individuals with a clear view on how the term’s largest cases should turn out? What were the justices thinking?”
....
