Here’s the right-wing billionaire “care-and-feeding-of-FedSoc-justices” count so far:
1. Harlan Crow to Clarence Thomas: “Undisclosed yacht and jet travel 1.0” in 2011 followed by “undisclosed yacht and jet travel 2.0” earlier this year; multiple vacations and gifts to Thomas family.
2. Paul Singer to Sam Alito: Undisclosed jet travel and Alaskan fishing vacation. Accompanied by Leonard Leo. Singer has had company cases before the Court and contributes to these groups that try to influence the Court: Manhattan Institute and Federalist Society.
3. Sokol and his wife have donated more than $1 million to Republican politicians and groups over the years.
4. Novelly’s family and companies have given at least $500k to Republican candidates/causes.
5. Charles Koch to Clarence Thomas: Possibly undisclosed jet travel and access to major right-wing donors, arranged by Leonard Leo.
Koch and his political operation are parties before the Court, bring litigation and file briefs, worked to get right-wing justices onto the Court, and use front groups to try to influence the Court.
Those groups include: American for Prosperity, Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation, and Competitive Enterprise Institute.
6. Robin Arkley II to Sam Alito: Undisclosed Alaskan fishing vacation. Accompanied by Leonard Leo, plus private jet travel for Leo. Arkley contributes to these groups that try to influence the Court: Judicial Crisis Network, Leo’s Court capture flagship.
7. Leonard Leo to Thomas and Alito: Leo has been made a de facto billionaire by $1.6 billion gift from reclusive right-wing billionaire Barre Seid, backer of Heartland Institute (famous for comparing climate scientists to the Unabomber).
Leo orchestrates gifts and free travel from right-wing billionaires to FedSoc justices. Featured in painting with Crow and Thomas. Directed money to Mrs. Thomas.
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The U.S. is far behind the E.U. on reducing plastics contamination because U.S. fossil fuel interests hold such sway with the Republican Party, so fossil fuel (including plastics) interests can come arrogantly to U.S. politics like they own the place — because they do. It’s sad.
More undisclosed private jet travel, more fingerprints of the billionaire-funded Court fixer Leonard Leo, more engagement with billionaire-funded organizations scheming to influence the Court.
Always the same little circle; always the Chosen Ones on the Court.
The case mentioned, Bonta, was an insidious one. The state-of-the-art tool of modern secret political influence is twinned 501c3 and 501c4 organizations. This case made donations secret to the 501c3 twin, even from state regulators. It was 6-3 with all the Chosen Ones signing up.
Justice Thomas’s additional disclosure filings, and the combative partisan lawyers’ letter that accompanied the filing, raise two major unanswered issues:
One is why things that we know Thomas received were not disclosed in amendments to the relevant years’ filings. The lawyers assert that there was a recent change in the rules, suggesting that Thomas’s filings before the change were compliant at the time and require no amendment.
But it’s not that simple. There is law on when a rule is clarified versus changed or revised. Clarifications are retroactive, and would require amending previous filings. The lawyers’ combative letter does not address this issue, it just says that there was a change.
Buried in Thomas’s lawyers’ overheated partisan rhetoric lie two key assertions: one, that “new guidance … revised reporting requirements”; and two, that his failures weren’t “willful.”
These are highly contestable and significant, but largely unsupported, assertions. They matter.
First, the assertion that reporting requirements were “revised” excuses prior misconduct. It’s more likely that the reporting requirements were explained, not revised, and were always thus. In fact, the Conference’s letter to me said that the new guidance “clarifies” the rules.
Here’s how you corrupt a country using the Supreme Court: first — obviously — you get a bunch of your friends on to the Supreme Court (whole separate scheme how that was done).
Then you get your friends on the Supreme Court to allow unlimited amounts of your special interest money into politics to buy unlimited political influence (Citizens United).
Then you make sure there is no enforcement of either the “transparency” or “independence” premises of Citizens United, so you can spend unlimited dark money and have back doors into candidates and campaigns.