Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Tx.) didn’t mince words during an interview with MSNBC, calling Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas “corrupt” after a new report revealed that he received close to $4.2 million in gifts.
Crockett sat in on an interview with MSNBC’s Melissa Murray to discuss the high court’s recent decision to overturn a ban on bump stock — the gun accessories used in some of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history. While discussing the ruling, Crockett touched on Thomas’s seemingly sneaky ways of receiving gifts. “Y’all were too nice before. Clarence Thomas is corrupt. End of story,” she said.
“No one gets this kind of money and isn’t influenced in any way. There will absolutely be a reckoning on November 5.”
Thomas has been under fire since 2023 after reports found he received high-valued gifts from GOP super donor and billionaire Harlan Crow. However, more has come to the surface. In mid-June 2024, Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) unveiled information showing that Thomas failed to disclose information on three additional trips funded by Crow. The report also noted the high court justice received close to $4.2 million in gifts — exceeding the amount of gifts given to any other judge.According to CNBC, Thomas was allegedly given 103 gifts valued at more than $2.4 million between 2004 and 2023. In comparison to his judicial colleagues, the other justices accepted just 93 gifts during the same time span worth a combined value of roughly $248,000. Fellow conservative Justice Samuel Alito was allegedly the sole receiver of the majority of those gifts — accepting 16 in total worth $170,095.
As the allegations came forward, Thomas’s lawyer, Elliot S. Berke, argued the information fell under the “personal hospitality exemption,” meaning Thomas didn’t need to disclose the trips.
Alito has also come under fire in the past few weeks over allegedly biased opinions that cater to conservative viewpoints. After reports surfaced of flags being flown over his homes — one being an upside-down American flag over his Alexandria, Virginia, residence — Crockett wasn’t too surprised at the ruling of the bump stock ban. “I’m sure Alito would find a reason for why that law is unconstitutional in some way,” she said.
“All of those gun manufacturers would win again.”
The ban was implemented following the mass shooting in Las Vegas during a country music concert that took the lives of 60 people and wounded hundreds more. Both former President Donald Trump and President Joe Biden’s administrations pushed the ban by having the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) identify semiautomatic guns with bump stocks as machine guns, which are banned under federal law.
With the 6-3 majority opinion, written by Thomas on June 14, he wrote the federal government had “stretched the law too far.” “We conclude that a semiautomatic rifle equipped with a bump stock is not a ‘machine gun’ because it does not fire more than one shot ‘by a single function of the trigger,’” the opinion read.
A family member of one of the victims, Christiana Duarte, said the ruling just opens the doors for more violence. “The ruling is really just another way of inviting people to have another mass shooting,” Danette Meyers, family friend and spokesperson, said.
“It’s unfortunate that they have to relive this again. They’re really unhappy.”
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