Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

‘Another Attempt to Manufacture a Scandal’: Friend of Clarence Thomas Hits Back at New Report Targeting the Justice

By Matthew Vadum
May 4, 2023

A friend of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is pushing back against a new report that claims a wealthy Republican donor paid for the private school tuition of the justice’s grandnephew.

During the presidency of Donald Trump, Mark Paoletta was general counsel to the Office of Management and Budget and before that, served as chief counsel to then-Vice President Mike Pence. He’s also a friend of Thomas and his wife, Ginni Thomas, whom he has represented as a lawyer.

Paoletta responded on May 4 to a ProPublica article published hours earlier that detailed how billionaire Harlan Crow’s company paid the private school tuition of Thomas’s grandnephew, Mark Martin, whom the justice took custody of when he was 6 years old and was raising like a son. The exact amount paid over four years at two schools was unclear but the article said it could be upwards of $150,000.


Paoletta disputes that estimate, saying Crow only covered the first year of tuition at each school.

In a nearly 600-word statement about Martin and the tuition payments, Paoletta wrote on his Twitter account that the Thomases had, beginning in 1997, “dev**ed twelve years of their lives to helping a beloved child in desperate need of love, support, and guidance.

“They agreed to take in this young child much as Justice Thomas’s grandparents had done for him and his brother in 1955.

“Justice Thomas and his wife made immeasurable personal and financial sacrifices and poured every ounce of their lives and hearts into giving their great nephew a chance to succeed.”

When the Thomases were trying to find a school where they could send Martin, Crow recommended Randolph-Macon Academy in Front Royal, Virginia, which he had attended. Crow also had funded scholarship programs for disadvantaged students at the school for decades, Paoletta wrote.

Crow paid only for Martin’s first year at Randolph-Macon and when Martin t***sferred to another school in Georgia, Crow paid for the first year at that school as well, Paoletta wrote.

“The Thomases love their great nephew. It is despicable that the press has d**gged him into their effort to smear Justice Thomas. This story is another attempt to manufacture a scandal about Justice Thomas. But let’s be clear about what is supposedly scandalous now: Justice Thomas and his wife dev**ed twelve years of their lives to taking in and caring for a beloved child—who was not their own—just as Justice Thomas’s grandparents had done for him.

“They made many personal and financial sacrifices to do this. And along the way, their friends joined them in doing everything possible to give this child a future. Harlan Crow’s tuition payments made directly to these schools on behalf of Justice Thomas’s great nephew did not constitute a reportable gift.”

The federal Ethics in Government Act didn’t require that the tuition payments be publicly disclosed “because the definition of a ‘dependent child’ under the Ethics in Government Act (5 U.S.C. 13101 (2)) does not include a ‘great nephew,’” Paoletta wrote.

“It is limited to a ‘son, daughter, stepson or stepdaughter.’ Justice Thomas never asked Harlan Crow to pay for his great nephew’s tuition. And neither Harlan Crow, nor his company, had any business before the Supreme Court. This malicious story shows nothing except for the fact that the Thomases and the Crows are kind, generous, and loving people who tried to help this young man.”

Crow, who is a major donor to Republicans, criticized a ProPublica report last month as a “political hit job,” after the media outlet stated that Crow had underwritten many luxurious vacations for Thomas and his wife and suggested that Crow’s purchase of Thomas’s mother’s house, with a view to one day turning it into a museum about the justice, was somehow a quid pro quo.

Crow has said he and Thomas have never discussed any cases pending before the Supreme Court.

Crow, a longtime friend of the Thomases and a prominent Trump supporter and conservative activist, said at the time that ProPublica was “funded by l*****ts” with “an agenda to destabilize the [Supreme] Court.” ProPublica is a left-wing nonprofit funded in part by the preeminent financier and Democratic Party donor George Soros, through his Foundation to Promote Open Society.

Soros has been widely criticized recently by conservatives and Republicans for funding the e******n campaigns of various district attorneys across the nation who are soft on crime.

The revelation that Thomases’ wealthy friend shares his largesse with them prompted Democrats to accuse Thomas of corruption and demand that the high court adopt a code of conduct, even though legal experts say there’s no conflict of interest because Crow hasn’t had business before the Supreme Court.

“Supreme Court justices are allowed to have friends, even if a particular friend is rich and a particular justice is conservative,” Ohio Northern University law professor Scott Douglas Gerber wrote in The Hill.

The Democrat-led Senate Judiciary Committee conducted a combative hearing on May 2, in which Democrats stated that the Supreme Court must adopt a code of conduct governing justices’ behavior or Congress will impose one on them. Republicans pushed back, saying Democrats have manufactured a phony ethics crisis to justify cracking down on the conservative-dominated court.

Democrats also are looking at ways to pressure the court by withholding congressional appropriations to it.

Legal experts say the Supreme Court has a special status because it was created by the U.S. Constitution, not by Congress. These experts also say this means that under the Constitution only the Supreme Court can regulate the internal workings of the Supreme Court. Justices say they voluntarily comply with public reporting requirements established by the Judicial Conference of the United States, a body created by Congress that sets rules for the federal judiciary.

Triple G

He and wife, Ginni, and Kelly Anne Conway have a lot of explaining (under oath) of their dealings. Whether or not there are laws currently in place to monitor and hold accountable people who deal in these kind of ethics, there should be some sort of investigation. John Roberts needs to step up. They can't use rationale that they didn't know they had to report it when emails surface that explicitly describe how they were trying to hide such t***sactions through false payments, etc.

Granted, a Congressional effort to address alleged partisan or politically driven judicial conflicts of interests, improper procedures, and extracurricular political activity could be a heavy lift politically. Shaping sensible but effective proposed solutions could prove complicated. But taking on such challenges would target a problem already concerning the e*****rate, the media, and academic and other experts. Crafting remedies applicable to Democratic and Republican appointees alike could confer credibility and put supporters on the high ground.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/fixgov/2022/03/23/how-to-rein-in-partisan-supreme-court-justices/

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Just another sleazy attempt at destroying Justice Thomas, more leftwing propaganda, Ginni Thomas' company was engaged in work for Conway's polling company and it has not been shown that was not the case.

Triple G

Are you blind and have no sense of smell? Thomas is not the only one. In a time when the SCOTUS reputation and in particular, people's appraisal of them, all scrutiny is timely and necessary to get back to some semblance of professional and accountable behavior by SCOTUS and our elected leaders.

This smells to high heaven!

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Yeah, OK that is fine, but surely it would be a miscarriage of justice to stop with the SCOTUS, the entire government both elected officials and unelected officials must be held accountable to t***sparent ethically accountable behavior if they are ever to regain the respect of the American people. What really smells to high heaven is the constant attack on Thomas and the conservative justices by the left, let's start with Biden and then move to the Senate only to follow up with the House and of course not stop there but review the relationships between high ranking department officials and the private sector. IE Comey being paid over $6 million in one year by Lockheed Martin while signing contracts with Robert Mueller then at the FBI worth billions of dollars.

Our government is as corrupt as any third world country's government and the media is content to bury its collective head in the sand.

Triple G

Pivot!

I'm not sure that I'd consider scrutiny of Thomas' activities as "constant" nor persecution. They all should get scrutiny. If I as a consultant, it's considered unethical to accept gifts worth $25 or more from clients or prospective clients, activities of other professionals should be scrutinized also.

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

I'm all for cleaning up the government, but the current smears of Thomas by the left are persecution, started with travel gifts but when compared to the other justices Thomas' travel and so called gifts were less remarkable and now we again see Ginni Thomas in the mix, something that we saw last year as well. No mention of the questionable activities of the other justices of which there were plenty, how about justice Sotomayor's signing a book deal worth millions yet not recusing from a case involving the company she signed with. Not saying that she is corrupt but just pointing out how biased the current outrage is.

"According to a report in the Daily Wire, she received $1.9 million from the publishing house in 2012. In 2013, she helped decide whether the court should take up a legal dispute between the company and a classmate of Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, who said his book proposal was stolen and used to make the movie “The Social Network.”

Triple G

All of that has been on the news -- maybe you're just extra sensitive when it's one of yours.

https://abovethelaw.com/2020/07/recusal-report-unveils-supreme-court-conflicts-of-interest/

Blurryeyed Loc: NC Mountains.

Really? It may have been reported in a few different outlets but I assure you that it was not reported in the mainstream.

Personally I think Thomas to be an outstanding jurist, I also think that the democrats have tried to destroy him since day one, or have you forgotten his confirmation hearings, or those of Kavanaugh as another example of how republicans are treated. Throughout his entire career on the court the Mainstream and democrats, sorry for being redundant, have questioned Thomas' intellect

You can play dumb if you choose to but please, do me a favor and play by yourself.

wilpharm Loc: Oklahoma

Racmanaz Loc: Sunny Tucson!

Why are the white Democrats so r****t that they have to continue the attack on a black man in a robe?

Triple G

One question? Who's giving the story air time and oxygen? Not a liberal!

Triple G

If you think I'm attacking anything besides questionable behavior, your comprehension sucks.

Racmanaz Loc: Sunny Tucson!

I said white democrats, I didn’t specify any particular person. But if the shoe fits.

Triple G

You posted as a response on my post. If not meant for me, then it should have been a general comment.