Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked Chief Justice John Roberts in a letter Thursday to exercise his powers to pressure Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas to recuse themselves from cases related to former President Trump.
“His position gives him substantial moral and persuasive authority to establish norms of behavior and hold his colleagues to comply with them,” the senator wrote. “I urge you to use this authority to convince Justices Thomas and Alito to recuse themselves in these cases – critical to our democracy and the rule of law – where their ‘impartiality may reasonably be questioned.’”
Blumenthal wrote his missive a day after Alito refused to recuse himself from Trump-related cases after Senate Democrats raised concerns about his impartiality over his display of two flags associated with the “Stop the Steal” movement on June 6. January 2021 in your Virginia. house and beach house in New Jersey.
Alito, in a letter to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), argued Wednesday that the flag incidents did not meet the disqualification standard of the judicial code of conduct and claimed that he had not “absolutely nothing to do” with flying upside down. flag lowered on his property after the January 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol.
And he said he had “no involvement in the decision” to fly an “Appeal to Heaven” flag at his beach house, informing Durbin that his wife was the person who raised both controversial displays.
“My wife likes to fly flags,” he said. “I am not”.
Blumenthal also cited Thomas’ refusal to recuse himself from Trump-related cases, despite his wife Ginni’s pro-Trump political activism and support for efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
“Judge Thomas did not recuse himself,” the senator noted. “He did not explain his decision. And the court’s ethical deficiencies have only increased.”
Blumenthal says Roberts should force Alito and Roberts to recuse themselves from the cases, using his authority to assign draft opinions and assign judges to district court work.
“I urge you not to assign opinions or circuits of justice to Justices Alito and Thomas if they do not recuse themselves from the United States v. Trump and other cases related to January 6th and the ‘Stop the Steal’ movement,” wrote Blumenthal. .
He warned that allowing them to preside over cases in which many Democrats fear they are biased in favor of Trump and his allies who tried to block the peaceful transfer of power in January 2021 would further undermine the court’s credibility.
“When a judge openly flies flags closely associated with a political candidate and then fails to recuse himself when that candidate becomes a litigant, it contributes to a precipitous decline in public confidence in the court,” Blumenthal wrote.
“And every time you ask this judge for the author and the court’s opinion — especially in a case about the allocation of electoral power — you sanction the judge’s ethical lapses,” he argued. “You are not just a spectator of bad behavior of your colleagues, you become a validator of their conduct.”
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
