A report from The New York Times details yet another luxury obtained by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas using funds from a wealthy associate. In this instance, it’s been revealed that he purchased a Prevost Marathon RV in 1999, using $267,230 received from Anthony Welters, a former executive at UnitedHealthCare who worked alongside Thomas in the Reagan administration, per the outlet. In a statement on the matter, Welters said that the funds were considered a loan and that it has since been “satisfied,” avoiding the phrasing “paid off,” which means it could have been a gift that would have then needed to be disclosed

  • Grant_M@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    Anthony Welters, a former executive at UnitedHealthCare who worked alongside Thomas in the Reagan administration

    A Democratic donor who worked for the Reagan admin? Come on now

      • norbert@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Yeah I don’t think anyone was upset because they thought it was only Republicans bribing people. A bribe from a Democrat(ic/lobbyist/whatever) is the problem. Taking the money and not saying anything about it is the problem to me. His co-worker coming out and saying “yeah congress doesn’t have any authority over us” last week is a problem to me. All these ruling-class college frat chums paying each other off and fucking everyone else in the process, is a problem to me.

    • rezifon@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I think you misread. The article seems to refer to Thomas’ time when he served in the Reagan administration and working alongside Welters who was an executive at UnitedHealthCare at the time.

      I agree it’s awkwardly phrased and hard to follow.

      • Grant_M@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Looks to me that Weller is an R who worked for Reagan at the time of the donation. His wife may have worked for Obama later on and could indeed be a Dem, or perhaps switched.

      • Grant_M@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        the dates and who was actually doing the donating at the time makes a difference.

    • nvimdiesel@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      I don’t care what their politics is. I hope pro publica takes this up and tracks the money to the source and prints eye watering story about it.

    • Ajen@sh.itjust.works
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      1 year ago

      Why is that hard to believe? Trump used to be a Democrat, Biden voted for anti-LGBQT laws (eg. DOMA), Liz Cheney has recently supported LGBQT rights, etc.

      • Grant_M@lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Trump has never been anything other than a deranged psychopath. He’s non-political. What I mean is it really doesn’t matter. Corruption is just corruption. The reporting is misleading. That’s what I take issue with.

  • edric@lemm.ee
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    1 year ago

    Why can the SC accept donations if they are supposed to be impartial?

    • nvimdiesel@kbin.social
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      1 year ago

      There are no rules saying they can’t. This is all still legal if completely immoral. SCOTUS is a co-equal branch of the government which in the past had be given to regulating itself. It’s starting to look like Congress will have to step in and pass some ethics constraints since SCOTUS won’t adopt one.

  • Burn_The_Right@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Why would a justice need a donation? They don’t have campaigns to finance. There isn’t any legal justification for a “donation”.

    “I didn’t pay that hitman, detective. I donated to him.”

    When articles refer to these payments as “donations”, they are becoming complicit in the lie.

      • herzberd@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        Reminds me of an episode of Common Sense by Dan Carlin from yeeears ago that basically said “the system is corrupt and voters aren’t able to command our politicians to do what we want, so what if we just pool money together and bribe them too?”

          • WoahWoah@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            What sort of bizarre elections are you voting in? I haven’t had the chance to bribe a politician with cash at the ballot box even once!

  • Pratai@lemmy.ca
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    1 year ago

    Not sure why this is such a big deal. He’s allowed to do it because no one will stop him. There is zero accountability in American governments.