by Joshua Kaplan, Justin Elliott & Alex Mierjeski @ProPublica
#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 #SupremeCourt.
Ken Burns Sets Record Straight Over Photo With Supreme Court Justice #ClarenceThomas
#KenBurns has made a statement after a photo surfaced of the documentary filmmaker w/ #SCOTUS justice Clarence Thomas & billionaire David Koch. While #Koch has funded one of Burns’ documentaries, Burns maintains that he & the Supreme Court Justice have no connections or relationship.
“Around 10 yrs ago, Ken was stopped & asked to take a photograph with a #SCOTUS Justice & David Koch, who was a supporter of public television & would later provide some funding for his film, ‘The Vietnam War.’ So he took the photo, as he has done with many, many others. Other than the taking of that photograph & innocuous pleasantries, that’s the extent of his contact with Justice Thomas,” a spokesperson for #KenBurns said in a statement to Variety.
On Jan25, 2018, dozens of private jets descended on PSP. Some of the richest people in the country were arriving for the annual winter donor summit of the #KochNetwork, the #political org founded by #libertarian#billionaires Charles & David #Koch. A long wknd of strategizing, relaxation in the CA sun & high-dollar #fundraising lay ahead.
Just after 6PM, a Gulfstream G200 jet touched down on the tarmac. One of the Koch network’s most powerful allies was on board: #SCOTUS Justice #ClarenceThomas.
During the summit, the justice went to a private dinner for the network’s #donors. #ClarenceThomas has attended #Koch donor events at least 2x over the yrs, acc/to interviews w/ 3 fmr network employees & 1 major donor. The justice was brought in to speak, staffers said, in the hopes that such #access would encourage donors to continue giving.
That puts #Thomas in the extraordinary position of having served as a #fundraising draw for a network that has brought cases before the #SupremeCourt, including one of the most closely watched of the upcoming term.
Thomas never reported the 2018 flight to PalmSprings on his annual #financial#disclosure form, an apparent #violation of #federal#law…. A #Koch network spox said the network did not pay for the #PrivateJet. Since Thomas didn’t disclose it, it’s not clear who did pay.
#ClarenceThomas’ involvement in the events is part of a yearslong, personal relationship w/the #KochBrothers that has remained almost entirely out of public view. It developed over years of trips to the Bohemian Grove, a #secretive all-men’s retreat in Northern California. #Thomas has been a regular at the Grove for 2 decades, where he stayed in a small camp w/real estate #billionaire#HarlanCrow & the Kochs….
In a series of stories this yr, ProPublica reported that #ClarenceThomas has accepted undisclosed luxury travel from #HarlanCrow & a coterie of other ultrawealthy men. #Crow also purchased #Thomas’ mother’s home & paid private school tuition for the child Thomas was raising as his son. Thomas has said little in response. In a stmnt earlier this yr, he said that Crow is a close friend whom he has joined on “family trips.” He has also argued that he was not required to disclose the free vacations…
But the #CodeOfConduct only applies to the lower courts. At the #SupremeCourt, justices decide what’s appropriate for themselves.
“I can’t imagine — it takes my breath away, frankly — that he would go to a #Koch network event for #donors,” said John E. Jones III, a ret #federal#judge appointed by President George W. #Bush. Jones said that if he had gone to a Koch summit as a district court judge, “I’d have gotten a letter that would’ve commenced a #disciplinary proceeding.”
After shepherding the case to the #court, #Koch network staff #attorneys are now asking the justices to overturn a decades-old #precedent. (#Thomas used to support the precedent but flipped his position in recent yrs. 🤔)
2 years ago, one of the network’s groups was the plaintiff in another #SCOTUS case, which was about #nonprofits’ ability to keep their #donors#secret. In that case, Thomas sided w/the 6-3 #conservative majority in the Koch group’s favor.
…The #Koch network is an overlapping set of “nonprofits” perhaps best known for its work helping cultivate the #TeaParty movement in the Obama yrs. Recently rebranded as StandTogether, the network includes the powerful Americans for Prosperity Action, which spent over $65M supporting #Republican candidates in the last election cycle.
Though Charles Koch is one of the 25 richest people in the world, worth an estimated $64B, he raises money from other wealthy people to amplify the network’s reach.
The #Koch network brought in at least $700M in 2021, the most recent yr for which data is available. It has >1k employees who, on paper, work for different grps.
But for all its complexity, the network is a centralized operation…. Many of the groups occupy the same bldgs in Arlington, VA, & share leadership & often staff. Many of the #donations go into a central pot, from which hundreds of millions of dollars are disbursed to the smaller groups focused on various #political & #social concerns….
For decades, the Kochs have held deep antipathy to govt #regulation. When Charles #Koch’s brother David ran for VP on the #Libertarian Party ticket in 1980, the party platform called for abolishing the #EPA, the #DOE & the #FDA.
Every winter, the network holds its marquee #fundraising event in Coachella Valley in SoCal. Hundreds of #donors fly in to learn how their money is being spent & plan for the coming yr. Fmr staffers describe an emphasis on preventing #leaks that bordered on obsession.
The network often rents out an entire hotel for the event, keeping out eavesdroppers. Documents left behind are methodically shredded. One recent attendee recalled #Koch security staff in a golf cart escorting their Uber driver out of the hotel to make sure he left. The fmr staffers spoke on the condition of anonymity because they feared #retaliation.
To score an invite to the summit, donors typically have to give at least $100,000 a year. Those who give in the millions receive special treatment, including dinners w/Charles #Koch & high-profile guests. Doling out #access to #powerful public officials was seen as a potent #fundraising strategy, fmr staffers said. The dinners’ purpose was “giving donors access & giving them a reason to come or to continue to come in the future,” a fmr Koch network exec told ProPublica.
#ClarenceThomas attended at least 1 dinner for top-tier #donors, acc/to a donor who attended & a fmr high-level #Koch network staffer.
“These donors found it fascinating,” said another fmr snr employee, recounting a #Thomas appearance at one summit…. “Donors want to feel special.…to feel on the inside.”
A fmr #fundraising Koch staffer said the org’s relationship w/ #Thomas was considered a valuable #asset: “Offering a high-level donor the experience of meeting w/someone like that — that’s huge.”
#Thomas’ appearances were arranged w/the help of #LeonardLeo, the #FederalistSociety leader, acc/to the fmr snr #Koch network employee. “Leonard was the conduit who would get him,” the former employee said. During one summit, Thomas gave a talk w/Leo in an interview format, the #donor recalled.
While attending the #donor events would likely #violate the lower courts’ prohibition on #fundraising, experts said, #SCOTUS has a narrow internal definition of a fundraiser: an event that raises more money than it costs or where attendees are explicitly asked for money while the event’s happening.
On the Thurs before the Jan 2018 summit in Palm Springs, #Thomas flew there on a chartered #PrivateJet….
4 days later, the plane flew to an airport outside Denver, where #Thomas appeared at a ceremony honoring his fmr clerk, federal Judge Allison Eid. The next day, it flew back to northern VA where Thomas lives.
Thomas’ financial disclosure for that year contains 2 speaking engagements: one in NYC & another at a #FederalistSociety conference in TX. His trip to the #Koch event in CA is not on the form.
For the event that year, the #Koch network rented out the (entire) Renaissance Esmeralda Resort & Spa. On the main stage, #donors heard from Hall of Fame NFL cornerback Deion Sanders, who was working w/the Kochs on anti-poverty programs in Dallas. Another speaker delivered a report card on the group’s #political wins large & small: “repealed voter-approved #donor#disclosure initiative”; “retraction of #mining & #environmental overreach”; “stopped Albuquerque #PaidSickLeave mandate.”
The first glimpse of #ClarenceThomas’ connection to the network came more than a decade ago. In 2010, reporters obtained an invitation sent to potential #Koch#donors that mentioned #Thomas had been “featured” at one of the network’s previous summits.
After critics called for more info about Thomas’ attendance, the #SCOTUS press office downplayed the episode. A court spox acknowledged Thomas had been in the Palm Springs “area” during the Kochs’ Jan 2008 summit.
However, she said #ClarenceThomas was there to talk about his memoir at a #FederalistSociety dinner that was separate from the donor summit but was also sponsored by Charles #Koch. She added that he made a “brief drop-by” at the network summit that yr but said he “was not a participant.” (#Thomas disclosed the 2008 Palm Springs trip as a Federalist Society speech.)
In the 15yrs since, the #Koch network has left a deep imprint on #American#society. Its advocacy is credited w/helping stamp-out #Republican support for combating #ClimateChange, once an issue that drew #bipartisan concern.The “full weight of the network” was thrown behind passing the 2017 #Trump#TaxCut, securing a windfall for the Kochs & their #donors & the upcoming #SCOTUS term could bring the network a victory it has pursued for yrs: overturning a major #legal#precedent known as #Chevron.
While most Americans aren’t familiar w/the 1984 case #ChevronvNRDC, it’s one of #SCOTUS’s most-cited decisions. #Legal scholars sometimes mention it in the same breath as #BrownVBoardOfEducation & #RoeVWade. In essence, #Chevron is about #GovernmentAgencies’ ability to issue #regulations. After a #law is enacted, it’s generally up to #agencies across the gov to make detailed rules to put it into effect. The Chevron decision said courts should be hesitant to second-guess agencies’ determinations.
The #Koch network has challenged Chevron in the courts & its #lobbyists have pushed #Congress to pass a #law nullifying the decision. It has also provided millions of $$ in #grants to #law professors making the case to #overturn it.
In 2005, #ClarenceThomas wrote the majority opinion in a case that EXPANDED #Chevron’s #protections for #GovernmentAgencies. 10yrs later, he was openly questioning the doctrine. Then in 2020, Thomas renounced HIS OWN earlier decision, writing that he’d determined the doctrine is #unconstitutional after all — a rare #reversal for a justice w/a reputation for being unmovable in his views.
By last year, #Koch network strategists sensed that victory could be at hand. During an internal briefing for network staff, Jorge Lima, a snr VP at Americans for Prosperity, said #SCOTUS seemed primed to radically change its approach to the issue. The network was trying to find cases that could bring about major changes in the #law, acc/to a video of the meeting obtained by the watchdog group Documented. “We’re doubling down on this strategy,” Lima told the crowd.
Several months later, #SCOTUS announced it would take up a case, #Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, in which #Koch network staff attorneys represent the plaintiffs. If #Thomas & his colleagues side w/them this coming term, #Chevron will be overturned once & for all.
W/o Chevron, “any place you would need #regulation to address a pressing #social problem, it’s going to be more costly to get it, harder to implement it & it’s not going to go as far,” said Noah Rosenblum, a prof at NYU #Law.
“#Loper Bright is a case seeking to restore one of the core tenets of our democracy: that Congress, not the administrative agency, makes the laws,” the #Koch network spokesperson said.
#SCOTUS itself said in a recent stmnt…that “justices exercise caution in attending events that might be described as #political in nature.” But unlike w/lower court judges, there is no formal #oversight….
2 decades ago, Justice #RuthBaderGinsburg delivered opening remarks at a lecture cosponsored by the NOW Legal Defense & Education Fund, a #women’s #rights group that filed friend-of-the-court briefs at the #SupremeCourt. It was a PUBLIC event & co-sponsored by the NYC Bar Association (#NYCBar).
13 #Republican lawmakers, including #MikePence & #MarshaBlackburn, who now sits on the #Senate#Judiciary Cmte, went further, calling on Ginsburg to #recuse herself from any future cases related to #abortion. The justice brushed off the criticism: “I think & thought & still think it’s a lovely thing,” she said of the lecture series. (#RBG died in 2020.)
Charles & David #Koch’s access to #ClarenceThomas has gone well beyond his participation in their #donor events. For years, the #KochBrothers had opportunities to meet privately w/ #Thomas thanks to the justice’s regular trips to the #BohemianGrove, an all-male retreat that attracts some of the nation’s most #influential#corporate & #political figures. Thomas has been a regular… for 25 yrs as #HarlanCrow’s guest, acc/to internal docs & interviews w/dozens of members, other guests & workers….
“…we’re seeing…someone who is living his professional life in a way that’s seeing… #extrajudicial opportunities as a #perk of the office,” said Charles Geyh, #JudicialEthics expert at IU law. Judges have social lives…& there are no clear lines for when a social gathering could pose a problem. But the confluence of #powerful#political actors & #undisclosed#gifts puts #Thomas’ trips far outside norm for judges’ #conduct, Geyh said: “There’s a culture of impartiality that’s really at risk here.”
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