Top Democrat Probing Justice Alito’s ‘Improper’ WSJ Interview
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) sent Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito a letter on Monday demanding further information regarding Alito’s interview with the Wall Street Journal last summer, which Whitehouse described as “improper.”
Whitehouse, who chairs the Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts, is probing “Alito’s improper comments about Congress’s ability to regulate Supreme Court ethics during a Wall Street Journal editorial page interview last year,” according to a statement from his office. The statement added:
This follows Justice Alito’s letter addressed to Whitehouse and Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), in which Justice Alito refused to recuse from cases related to the January 6th insurrection, despite the display of MAGA battle flags at two of his homes.
“Given your informative response to the letter I sent with Chairman Durbin on May 23, 2024, I wonder if you might be able to provide some information regarding your interview that appeared in the Wall Street Journal’s editorial page on July 28, 2023. In that interview, you opined on questions related to Congress’s authority over judicial, and more specifically Supreme Court, ethics concerns. The interview raised several problems,” wrote Whitehouse.
Whitehouse took particular issue with the fact that Alito told conservative lawyer David B. Rivkin that Congress has no power over the Supreme Court:
“I know this is a controversial view, but I’m willing to say it,” he says. “No provision in the Constitution gives them the authority to regulate the Supreme Court—period.”
Do the other justices agree? “I don’t know that any of my colleagues have spoken about it publicly, so I don’t think I should say. But I think it is something we have all thought about.”
Whitehouse wrote to Alito about this statement, adding:
It thus appears that you offered an improper opinion regarding a question that might come before the Court; did so in the context of a known ongoing legal dispute involving that precise question; did so at the behest of an interviewer who as a lawyer represented a client in that ongoing dispute; and did so to the benefit of his client, your personal friend, and to the benefit of yourself, as a recipient of undisclosed gifts that are the subject of our investigation. […] I note that the Supreme Court is the only place in all of government where issues of this nature have no place or means of investigation or resolution. […] So far, my questions regarding these events seem to have disappeared into a black hole of indifference.
Alito has been in hot water in recent months both for flying flags related to the Jan. 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol at his home and for accepting “private jet travel to an all-expenses-paid Alaskan fishing vacation” from billionaire Paul Singer, who is also a GOP mega-donor.
Alito’s assertion that the Supreme Court was above Congressional oversight or regulation also led to pushback last summer. Law professor Steve Vladeck replied to Alito’s claim at the time, noting, “It’s not just a “controversial” position; it’s belied by 234 years of practice, and would turn the separation of powers totally on its head. It’s rather stunning that he’d say this out loud. Stunning—& revealing of the extent to which he thinks the Court *must* be unaccountable.”
Read Sen. Whitehouse’s full letter here.
