Senate Judiciary Report on Supreme Court Ethics Released

An ongoing investigation uncovered several possible ethical issues related to gifts and those serving on the Supreme Court.

The Details: The Senate judiciary report found that Justice Clarence Thomas accepted more than $4.75 million, which included vacations and trips with various activities.

For Context: The report, conducted by Democratic senators, took over two years and found 14 instances of ethical lapses. A code of conduct related to ethical violations was put into place in 2023 but is lacking due to enforcement.

How the Media Covered It: Outlets on the left like the Associated Press (Left bias) noted the acceptance of the reported gifts as an obvious and unacceptable ethical lapse for someone of Thomas’ stature. Outlets on the right such as Newsmax (Right bias) covered the details of the investigation but did not frame the circumstances in a way that showed obvious lapses in ethics. Center sources such as Newsweek (Center bias) also noted that the new ethics code put into effect in 2023 has failed in terms of enforcement, calling for partisan agreement.