By Steve Benen After ethics questions surrounding Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas intensified, Senate Democrats began a formal process of seeking more information. The latest reporting from The New York Times suggests they’ve uncovered some relevant new details. Justice Clarence Thomas failed to publicly disclose additional private travel provided by the wealthy conservative donor Harlan Crow, a top Democratic senator said in a letter on Monday.
Customs and Border Protection records revealed that the justice and his wife, Virginia Thomas, took a round trip between Hawaii and New Zealand in November 2010 on Mr. Crow’s private jet, according to the letter. Senator Ron Wyden, Democrat of Oregon, writing to Mr.
Crow’s lawyer, demanded that he supply more information about the financial relationship between the two men. The fact that the underlying issue is several years old doesn’t come as too big of a surprise: I first started writing about Crow and his generosity toward Thomas more than 13 years ago . But that doesn’t make the apparent revelation any less notable: The Senate Finance Committee appears to have evidence of another instance in which a sitting Supreme Court justice took flights on a Republican megadonor private plane and failed to disclose.
In a detailed letter to Thomas’ attorney, Wyden, who chairs the Finance Committee, wrote, “I am deeply concerned that Mr. Crow may have been showering a public official with extravagant gifts, then writing off.