Senate Judiciary panel to review 2014 Supreme Court leak claim

Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) announced his panel is reviewing "serious allegations" in a New York Times report Saturday that a 2014 Supreme Court ruling was leaked to a former anti-abortion activist weeks in advance.

The latest: Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) and Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), who chair courts subcommittees, wrote to Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts to ask whether any action had been taken over the alleged 2014 leak and suggested they'd investigate if not, Politico first reported Sunday night.

"If the Court, as your letter suggests, is not willing to undertake fact-finding inquiries into possible ethics violations that leaves Congress as the only forum," they wrote, in reference to earlier correspondence with Roberts about reports that a religious group had allegedly tried to influence justices.

Driving the news: Justice Samuel Alito, who wrote majority opinions in both the 2014 Hobby Lobby contraception and religious-liberty case and the leaked draft opinion of the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, has said any suggestion that he or his wife disclosed the 2014 ruling early to anyone was "false."