A new ProPublica report renews questions about Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s disclosure of gifts. It could pose a conflict of interest.
Justice Samuel Alito is the latest Supreme Court judge to face scrutiny over his acceptance of luxury travel and gifts, raising new questions about the Court’s impartiality and legitimacy.
A ProPublica report published on Tuesday revealed that Alito accepted a trip on a private jet as well as lodging as part of a fishing excursion to Alaska in 2008. That flight was covered by a Republican donor and hedge fund manager named Paul Singer, whose business later had multiple cases before the Supreme Court that Alito did not recuse himself from.
Alito’s decision not to disclose the private jet trip was a likely violation of the Ethics in Government Act, which requires the disclosure of transportation gifts, legal experts told Vox. Additionally, ethics experts say Alito’s decision not to recuse himself from subsequent cases, including a major decision in 2014, could create the appearance of a conflict of interest, undermining trust in the Court’s decisions.
Alito claims those legal and ethics experts are wrong. Though he did not comment directly in the ProPublica story, he did counter both allegations via a Wall Street Journal op-ed he published on Tuesday. In that op-ed, Alito argued that he did not need to disclose the travel gift because it qualified as personal “hospitality,” which he argued is exempted from such rules. He also claimed that he was unaware of the connection Singer had to the business in the 2014 case he weighed in on, which is why he did not recuse himself. Alito said, too, that even if he knew of Singer’s ties, he wouldn’t have had to recuse himself because they did not discuss any business or cases before the court in their interactions.
“Neither charge is valid,” Alito wrote.
Ethics experts note that transportation has not been exempted from disclosures in the law, and say that Alito’s interpretation of such rules is a bit of a stretch. Additionally, some are calling for document reforms, arguing that information about the parties before the Court should be more transparent if Alito was unable to identify Singer’s ties to the business affected in the 2014 case he oversaw.
