US Supreme Court Justices and Other Judges Can Stay in Corporate Homes Without Disclosing Information

U.S. Supreme Court justices and lower federal judges do not have to publicly disclose when they dine or stay at someone’s private residence, even if it is owned by a business entity, under revised ethics rules.

The revised policy was issued Monday by the Financial Disclosure Committee of the U.S. Judicial Conference, which sets rules for the nine justices and other federal judges. Critics say the move weakens ethical requirements.

The committee was considering allegations that Justice Clarence Thomas, a member of the court’s 6-3 conservative majority, unlawfully failed to report donations, including luxury trips, from wealthy Texas businessman and Republican Party donor Harlan Crow.

“They might as well call it the Clarence Thomas exception,” said Donald Sherman, general counsel for the group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), referring to the revised policy.

The U.S. Supreme Court has been embroiled in a growing ethics controversy, with some Democratic lawmakers and court reform advocates pointing to cases of undisclosed travel and gifts involving Thomas and several other justices. The court last year issued its first formal code of conduct governing ethical behavior for judges, though the policy had no enforcement mechanism.

The judiciary regulator said its disclosure rules were being updated this week to “clarify” the extent to which gifts received at private residences owned by corporate entities can be considered “personal hospitality” that judges do not have to include in their disclosure reports.

Gabe Roth, head of the human rights group Fix the Court, said the new policy weakens stricter rules announced last year and “warps” the meaning of personal hospitality in a way that could result in some of Thomas’s past stays at Crow properties being exempt from disclosure.

As first reported by ProPublica, those stays included stays at Camp Topridge, a private lakeside resort in the Adirondack Mountains in upstate New York owned by a Crow affiliate, Topridge Holdings.

Thomas said last year he was advised not to report this type of “personal hospitality.”

Attorneys for Thomas and Crow and representatives for the Supreme Court did not respond to requests for comment.

The Disclosure Commission, at the request of Democratic U.S. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and others, adopted tougher rules in March 2023 that made it harder for judges to invoke the personal hospitality exception.

The rules said judges still didn’t have to disclose gifts that included food, lodging or entertainment provided by an individual for non-business purposes. However, the rules said the exemption didn’t apply to stays at commercial properties, such as hotels and resorts, or hospitality gifts paid for by an entity or third party other than the person providing them.

Under a rule change introduced Monday, stays at hosts’ private residences will not have to be disclosed if the property is owned by an entity rather than an individual, provided the residence was not regularly rented out and was not a commercial property.