Conservative activist Leonard Leo was hit with a subpoena from Senate Democrats on Thursday as a part of a probe into Supreme Courtroom ethics and whether or not people or teams used luxurious items to entry justices.
The subpoena from the Senate Judiciary Committee arrives months after it was licensed, CNN reported. “Mr. Leo has performed a central position within the ethics disaster plaguing the Supreme Courtroom and, not like the opposite recipients of knowledge requests on this matter, he has achieved nothing however stonewall the committee,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-In poor health.), the committee’s chairman, mentioned in an announcement to the outlet. “This subpoena is a direct results of Mr. Leo’s personal actions and decisions.”
Leo is the co-chair of the Federalist Society, the influential conservative legal professionals community, and leads a sprawling darkish cash operation working to affect the courts, politics, and coverage. In 2021, Leo was the beneficiary of a historic $1.6 billion darkish cash donation. He informed CNN that he wouldn’t adjust to the subpoena, calling it “illegal” and the “left’s darkish cash effort to silence and cancel political opposition.”
As Rolling Stone reported in February, Leo has been quietly increasing his dark-money community. “As Leonard Leo faces rising scrutiny for his shady nonprofit community, it’s no shock he’s desperately attempting to rebrand,” mentioned Caroline Ciccone, president on the watchdog group Accountable.US. “However regardless of what number of sketchy new teams he comes up with, he can’t rebrand the intense agenda he’s nonetheless making an attempt to drive on on a regular basis Individuals.”
Throughout his time as then-President Donald Trump’s judicial adviser, Leo helped construct the Supreme Courtroom’s conservative 6-3 supermajority and choose three justices. He did so whereas main an outdoor community that spreads cash round to assist deliver circumstances earlier than the Supreme Courtroom, decide which circumstances the justices think about, and affect the court docket’s choices. The crowning achievement on this technique was the court docket’s 2022 resolution overturning Roe v. Wade, eliminating federal protections for abortion.
Over the previous yr, the Supreme Courtroom has confronted unprecedented scrutiny, following studies from ProPublica detailing Justice Clarence Thomas‘ shut relationship with Nazi-obsessed billionaire and GOP donor Harlan Crow, who supplied items and journeys to Thomas that the justice did not disclose.
Leo has performed a job in a few of these scandals. In accordance with The Washington Put up, Leo steered secret consulting funds to Thomas’ spouse, Ginni.
Leo additionally helped prepare Justice Samuel Alito’s seat on a non-public jet, paid for by a billionaire hedge fund chief, as a part of a trip at an Alaskan luxurious fishing lodge paid for by one other conservative donor. Alito didn’t disclose the personal jet flight.
The Senate Judiciary subpoena comes after Leo refused to supply the committee with a full accounting of items and funds he has directed to Supreme Courtroom justices and their spouses.
In November, the excessive court docket adopted its first-ever code of ethics. Nevertheless, Democrats known as out the dearth of a mechanism to implement the code, permitting justices to police themselves.
