Harlan Crow – Clarence Thomas: Follow the money, gifts and trips.
“Clarence Thomas and Other Crow Holdings. The Supreme Court is corrupt.” – Prevail
Clarence Thomas’s brazen violation of ethics rules, briefly explained. By quietly accepting luxuries from a GOP megadonor, Thomas likely ran afoul of federal ethics law. – VOX
Right-wing pundits rushed to defend Harlan Crow’s gifts to Clarence Thomas and his Nazi memorabilia collection — without disclosing their ties to the mega-donor. – The Lever
Follow the money, gifts and luxury trips with this map and decide for yourself. Should Supreme Court Justices be taking luxury trips with billionaires. Not disclose them. And be hearing cases that billionaire supported groups have in front of the Supreme Court. Should the Supreme Court have a code of ethics? Should Clarence Thomas recuse himself for deciding the Student Debt Relief decision which has an amicus brief brought from the Manhattan Institute, a Harlan Crow supported group?
Company manages more than $16 billion in assets
Born in 1949 in Dallas, Texas, Crow is a 74-year-old real estate developer and the chairman of Crow Holdings, a Dallas-based real estate development and investment firm that was started by his father, Trammell Crow. According to Crow Holdings’ website, the company manages more than $16 billion in assets. He’s commonly referred to as a billionaire in the media. He’s also spent extravagantly, including buying a home in Dallas for $55 million in 2014 and renovating it with 77-car underground garage, and has spent $25 million building the largest privately-owned bell tower, standing at 288 feet, right outside his office in Dallas. – Business Insider
According to the Bush Center, Crow serves on the boards of the American Enterprise Institute, Thomas Jefferson Foundation and the Supreme Court Historical Society.
Harlan Crow donations
Ginni Thomas launched Liberty Central with an anonymous donation of $500,000 and another of $50,000, sparking questions about potential conflicts of interest for her husband. (Months after the launch, Politico reported that the $500,000 investment had come from Harlan Crow, a Texas real estate magnate and major donor to conservative candidates and causes who had also given Clarence Thomas a Bible worth $19,000 that had once belonged to Frederick Douglass, according to the justice’s financial disclosures.) – WaPo
Dark money politics
Crow was an early adopter of dark money in politics. As the researcher Aaron Harris points out: “With $550K from Harlan Crow, Ginni Thomas founded what may have been the very first dark money group with Leonard Leo, Liberty Central, in late 2009—weeks or months before the Citizens United ruling. Leo registered it in VA one week before” the ruling that opened the spigot to political dark money. – Prevail
Favorable rulings from Clarence
The researcher UsHadrons sums it up neatly: “Crow served on the board of the American Enterprise Institute and Center for the Community Interest. AEI and CCI filed a total of eleven briefs with the court. Thomas either sided with AEI and CCI positions or took a position that was more extreme in all eleven cases.” – Prevail
AEI filed at least three briefs in the Supreme Court after giving Thomas this very expensive gift, and Thomas either sided with AEI or took a position that was much more extreme that AEI’s in all three of these cases. ThinkProgress has now learned that a second Harlan Crow-affiliated group, the Center for the Community Interest, has a perfect record in front of Justice Thomas.
Crow served on CCI’s board alongside failed Bush judicial nominee Miguel Estrada. Westlaw’s database of Supreme Court briefs reveals eight briefs filed by CCI in eight different Supreme Court cases, and Justice Thomas voted for CCI’s preferred outcome in every single one of these cases. – Think Progress
Learn more
Clarence Thomas and the Billionaire – ProPublica
Clarence Thomas and Other Crow Holdings – Prevail
The Paid Pundits Defending Clarence Thomas And His Billionaire Benefactor – The Lever
Clarence Thomas’s brazen violation of ethics rules – Vox
Second Harlan Crow Connected Group Has A Perfect Litigation Record Before Justice Thomas – ThinkProgress
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TakeAway: Demand a code of ethics for the Supreme Court and that compromised Justices need to recuse themselves from cases involve people and the groups they support who have given them gifts, trips or donated to their spouse.
Deepak
DemLabs
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Reposted from Democracy Labs with permission.
