UNITED STATES: Mitch McConnell, the U.S Senate Republican Leader, on Tuesday expressed his support for the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court as Democrats exhorted him to look into lavish vacations taken by Justice Clarence Thomas that were funded by a Republican donor.
McConnell told reporters, “I have total confidence in the Chief Justice of the United States to deal with these court internal issues.”
In a letter to Chief Justice John Roberts dated April 10, Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats alleged that Thomas’ actions violated ethical standards.
The committee intends to hold a hearing on the subject, but no date has yet been declared.
In an article published on April 6 by ProPublica, it was revealed that Thomas had secretly taken pricey trips from Republican donor and real estate tycoon Harlan Crow over decades.
Thomas defended the outings, saying that he had been told he was not required to record this kind of “personal hospitality.” The conservative justice, however, declared that he would follow the newly implemented, stricter regulations.
The U.S Senate’s Republican leader defended the Supreme Court’s independence in his first week back after suffering a fall last month, despite calls from Democrats for new ethics regulations and a probe into Justice Clarence Thomas’s financial activities.
When asked to comment during a press conference on Tuesday, McConnell said he is confident the Supreme Court can handle any ethical issues internally.
The Senate Minority Leader, McConnell, also stressed that the Democrats’ attempt to challenge the independence of the judiciary is not a new approach.
“The Supreme Court and the court system is a whole separate part of our Constitution, and the Democrats it seems to me spent a lot of time criticizing individual members of the court and going after the court as an institution,” said McConnell.
Crow, who is at the centre of the Thomas saga, recently gave an interview in which he defended his connections with Rhomas and refuted ProPublica’s allegations.
“I don’t think the media really cares much about Harlan Crow, and I think they’re right. They shouldn’t care much about Harlan Crow,” he said. “But he thinks that the news media, and particularly the ProPublica group, which is funded by leftists, have an agenda to destabilise the court. What they have done is not truthful and lacks integrity.”
“They’ve done a pretty good job in the last week or two of unfairly slamming me and, more importantly than that, unfairly slamming Justice Thomas,” he continued.
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