you lose that trust
especially in the institution that i'm
in
it changes the institution fundamentally
you begin to look over your shoulder
it's like kind of an infidelity
justice clarence thomas recently
lamenting the leak of a draft opinion
indicating the supreme court will soon
overturn roe versus wade while the
ruling is not final justice thomas has
not weighed in on another issue that has
also raised questions about the
credibility of the high court it's an
issue involving someone very close to
him and one that may present a major
conflict of interest
emails show his wife the conservative
activist jenny thomas lobbied arizona
state lawmakers to overturn the results
of the 2020 election she messaged two
state representatives encouraging them
to pick a quote clean slate of electors
in other words trump friendly electors
to fight unfounded claims of election
fraud this new reporting is in addition
to what we learned last month that jenny
thomas also sent several texts to former
trump white house chief of staff mark
meadows urging him to try to overturn
the election the nature of the texts has
led to questions about whether justice
thomas should recuse himself from any
future cases related to last year's
insurrection at the u.s capitol robert
costa one of the journalists following
the story tweeted following the remarks
by justice thomas on the supreme court
leak costa saying justice thomas has
still not commented on cbs news
washington post reporting on his
spouse's communications with the trump
white house about legal strategy and
personnel in the weeks after the 2020
election
here now to discuss is tyler cooper
senior researcher at fix the court it's
a non-partisan organization pushing for
more transparency and accountability at
the supreme court tyler we appreciate
you coming on the show now many
lawmakers have called for justice thomas
to recuse himself some progressives even
calling for him to resign neither of
course have happened so what is the most
likely outcome here is there a solution
unfortunately the most likely outcome is
that justice thomas is going to continue
to make decisions that justice thomas
things are appropriate and um
unfortunately there's no ethics code for
the supreme court so there's nothing
that we can point to to compel him to
recuse in cases that his uh that he has
an interest in his wife isn't interested
in
however he should still recuse in those
cases because there is a federal statute
on refusal 28 usc 455 which says that if
a judge or justice um their impartiality
may recently be questioned then they
must disqualify themselves from the case
or matter
why is there no code of ethics
um the short answer is that it's because
the supreme court has decided they don't
need one that they are happy with uh
consulting whatever sources that they
particularly feel to consult with uh to
decide these sort of questions and they
don't think that it's necessary to go
anywhere else um
it is interesting that uh the supreme
court testified for congress um elena
kagan uh mentioned that uh justice
roberts was uh looking into the question
of whether to have a code of conduct
specifically covering the supreme court
that was a couple of years ago we've had
no updates and no recent belief that any
progress has been made there so it seems
that they are content with the status
quo um and just fascinating anyone that
is going to question them on any kind of
issues of diesel now republicans have
been focusing a lot on the roe versus
wade leake itself let's listen quickly
to what senate minority leader mitch
mcconnell had to say earlier this month
the integrity and independence of the
supreme court
is once again under attack
so given that how much of an integrity
and independence problem is that
compared to
say how politicized the nomination and
confirmation of supreme court justices
has become i mean of course uh before he
became attorney general republicans had
blocked barack obama's nominee merrick
garland uh his chances to join the high
court
yeah all these questions over the league
uh seem to mostly just be a distraction
from the situation that we have uh
justice alito writing a very very strong
and aggressive opinion overturning uh a
precedent that's the 50 years um so we
don't even know where the leak came from
whether it was uh from the liberal side
or the conservative side um so we don't
know what the motives are um and and
really the idea that you played flip
earlier of justice thomas talking about
you have to be looking over your
shoulder you're concerned or something
that doesn't really hold because this is
an opinion that was being circulated
internally this was something that was
ready um for consideration i was sure he
didn't think that this draft would be
shared with public
but it would only be shared amongst each
other if it was something that was ready
for prime time this is something that it
was full of legal citations it had 30
pages of appendices at the back this was
something that was ready that
we know that this is at least what
justice alito believes should happen so
whether it has five votes um we'll see
it in time um but it has been a lot of
kind of distraction over the league and
it's really i think to avoid what the
actual outcome of that decision would be
and how extreme it is how extreme
justice leo wrote that opinion let's
talk more broadly about the supreme
court president biden is under pressure
from progressives to add more justices
to the high court that does seem
unlikely so what are some realistic
reforms or improvements that could be
made to the supreme court
sure um so there has been interest in
congress and at least
legislation that would mandate the
supreme court adopt its own code of
ethics that seems to be a very minimal
bar um it again would be tasking the
supreme court with doing it so any sort
of concerns over congress picking the
the code of ethics would be obviated by
that it would be the supreme court
itself choosing what it wants to hold
itself to just letting us know what that
is so that is legislation that's ongoing
congress has already acted to hold um
federal judges and supreme court
justices to the same sort of
transparency related to financial
disclosure as as they already report to
that that was signed by president um
just recently um so that that's good to
see there and hopefully they'll be more
interested in ethics going forward and
on the hill
tyler cooper with the non-partisan
organization fix the court we appreciate
your time sir
thank you