Ocasio-Cortez calls for Thomas impeachment over report

(The Hill) — Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) is calling for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to be impeached following a report that he accepted luxurious gifts from a billionaire Republican donor for decades.

For years, Thomas took luxury trips and outings on yachts and private jets owned by Dallas businessman Harlan Crow, according to an investigation by ProPublica. Thomas did not disclose the travel, the investigation found. Crow has donated lavishly to Republican candidates.

Ocasio-Cortez blasted the alleged actions as an “almost cartoonish” level of corruption.

“This is beyond party or partisanship,” Ocasio-Cortez said on Twitter. “This degree of corruption is shocking — almost cartoonish. Thomas must be impeached.”

The New York congresswoman also said the report of Thomas’s alleged misconduct reflects negatively on Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts. 

“Barring some dramatic change, this is what the Roberts court will be known for: rank corruption, erosion of democracy, and the stripping of human rights,” Ocasio-Cortez continued.

Ocasio-Cortez is not the only Democratic lawmaker to blast Thomas after the report was released. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said the news called for an independent investigation.

“This cries out for the kind of independent investigation that the Supreme Court — and only the Supreme Court, across the entire government— refuses to perform,” Whitehouse said on Twitter.

Crow in a statement did not deny the allegations that Thomas had accepted such trips from him over the years, but he said the Supreme Court justice never asked for the gifts.

“The hospitality we have extended to the Thomas’s over the years is no different from the hospitality we have extended to our many other dear friends,” Crow said in a statement. “Justice Thomas and Ginni never asked for any of this hospitality,” referring to the justice’s wife, Ginni Thomas.