Kaplan’s work with colleagues at ProPublica has received national honors including a George Polk Award, an Edward R. Murrow Award and the Al Nakkula Award for Police Reporting. He holds a degree in mathematics from the University of Chicago.
Interviews and newly unearthed documents reveal that Thomas, facing financial strain, privately pushed for a higher salary and to allow Supreme Court justices to take speaking fees.
Experts say it is unclear if the new rules, which come after reporting by ProPublica and others revealed that justices had repeatedly failed to disclose gifts and travel from wealthy donors, would address the issues raised by the recent revelations.
Even by Thomas’ own permissive interpretation, the justice’s recently revealed travel to Palm Springs and the Bohemian Grove appear to violate the disclosure law, experts explained.
Thomas has attended at least two Koch donor summits, putting him in the extraordinary position of having helped a political network that has brought multiple cases before the Supreme Court.
The new filing comes after ProPublica’s reporting on the Supreme Court justice’s beneficial relationship with the billionaire GOP megadonor. Thomas also reported three private jet trips provided by Crow.
In the years after the undisclosed trip to Alaska, Republican megadonor Paul Singer’s hedge fund has repeatedly had business before the Supreme Court. Alito has never recused himself.
In response to ProPublica reporting, the friend said Crow covered two years of schooling for the teen, which would amount to roughly $100,000 of undisclosed gifts. Meanwhile, Democrats renewed calls for judicial ethics overhaul.
Crow paid for private school for a relative Thomas said he was raising “as a son.” “This is way outside the norm,” said a former White House ethics lawyer.
The transaction is the first known instance of money flowing from Crow to the Supreme Court justice. The sale netted the GOP megadonor two vacant lots and the house where Thomas’ mother was living.
The lawmakers said the chief justice was duty-bound to conduct a “swift, thorough, independent and transparent investigation” of Thomas’ undisclosed travel with billionaire Harlan Crow in order to “safeguard public faith in the judiciary.”
In response to a ProPublica report, Thomas explained why he did not disclose lavish travel provided by billionaire Harlan Crow. But legal experts maintain the justice was required to make these disclosures.
Influential Democratic legislators are pushing for changes at the Supreme Court and a probe into Thomas’ undisclosed luxury trips provided by powerful conservative donor Harlan Crow.
Island-hopping on a superyacht. Private jet rides around the world. The undisclosed gifts to Thomas have no known precedent in the modern history of the Supreme Court. “It’s incomprehensible to me that someone would do this,” says one former judge.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton hasn’t just been pursuing supposed voter fraud. His office has also criminally investigated at least 10 election workers, in a harbinger of potential post-midterm turmoil.
Vladimir Putin has increasingly relied on the Wagner Group, a private and unaccountable army with a history of human rights violations, to pursue Russia’s foreign policy objectives across the globe.
In firsthand accounts, Afghan civilians and U.S. Marines describe the desperate struggle to flee through the Kabul airport’s last open entrance. U.S. officials knew an attack was coming. Then a suicide bomber killed and injured hundreds.
Guilfoyle, fiancee of Donald Trump Jr., boasted in text messages that she raised $3 million for the Jan. 6 rally. The demand for legal documents and a deposition is the first for a member of the Trump family’s inner circle.
Paths left unsecured by U.S. military sped the evacuation of American citizens and Afghan allies. The attack killed 13 U.S. service members and scores of civilians.
Thank you for your interest in republishing this story. You are are free to republish it so long as you do the following:
You have to credit ProPublica and any co-reporting partners. In the byline, we prefer “Author Name, Publication(s).” At the top of the text of your story, include a line that reads: “This story was originally published by ProPublica.” You must link the word “ProPublica” to the original URL of the story.
If you’re republishing online, you must link to the URL of this story on propublica.org, include all of the links from our story, including our newsletter sign up language and link, and use our PixelPing tag.
If you use canonical metadata, please use the ProPublica URL. For more information about canonical metadata, refer to this Google SEO link.
You can’t edit our material, except to reflect relative changes in time, location and editorial style. (For example, “yesterday” can be changed to “last week,” and “Portland, Ore.” to “Portland” or “here.”)
You cannot republish our photographs or illustrations without specific permission. Please contact [email protected].
It’s okay to put our stories on pages with ads, but not ads specifically sold against our stories. You can’t state or imply that donations to your organization support ProPublica’s work.
You can’t sell our material separately or syndicate it. This includes publishing or syndicating our work on platforms or apps such as Apple News, Google News, etc.
You can’t republish our material wholesale, or automatically; you need to select stories to be republished individually. (To inquire about syndication or licensing opportunities, contact [email protected].)
You can’t use our work to populate a website designed to improve rankings on search engines or solely to gain revenue from network-based advertisements.
We do not generally permit translation of our stories into another language.
Any website our stories appear on must include a prominent and effective way to contact you.
If you share republished stories on social media, we’d appreciate being tagged in your posts. We have official accounts for ProPublica on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
Copy and paste the following into your page to republish:
