On Friday, it was revealed that in 2021, Alito’s home displayed an inverted flag, a symbol of protest by Donald Trump supporters.
Republicans have slammed conservative Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito after a photo of an upside-down American flag outside of his house made headlines.
A New York Times report published on Thursday showed the photo of the inverted flag, which was recently obtained by the publication. The photo was taken outside Alito’s home in Alexandria, Virginia, on January 17, 2021, three days before Joe Biden was inaugurated as president. After then-President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election and claimed, without any evidence, that Biden’s victory was a sham, many of Trump’s supporters displayed an upside-down American flag as a sign of protest.
The photo was taken in the wake of the Capitol Riot on January 6, 2021, when Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., to stop Congress from certifying Biden’s 2020 election win after Trump claimed that the election was stolen via widespread voter fraud. While the inverted flag was up on Alito’s property, the Supreme Court was still deciding whether to hear a case challenging the results of the 2020 election. The Court ended up not hearing the case, which Alito and Justice Neil Gorsuch, a conservative appointed by Trump, dissented from.
In a statement to the Times, Alito blamed his wife for the inverted flag.
“I had no involvement whatsoever in the flying of the flag,” Alito said in an email to the Times. “It was briefly placed by Mrs. Alito in response to a neighbor’s use of objectionable and personally insulting language on yard signs.”
Newsweek reached out to the Supreme Court via online form for comment.
Republicans who have been critical of Trump voiced their outrage over the revelations of the Times’ report.
Alyssa Farah Griffin, former White House director of strategic communications under Trump who testified against him to the January 6 House Select Committee, wrote on X, formerly Twitter: “US flag code states the American flag should not be flown upside down except as a symbol of dire national distress. That a SCOTUS Justice would allow this to be displayed at his home days before a peaceful, lawful transition of power is deeply disturbing.
