Congresswoman introduces articles of impeachment against SCOTUS justices

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., on Wednesday accused Supreme Court justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas of failing to disclose financial gifts they’d received. She claimed that the unchecked behavior of Supreme Court justices had created a constitutional crisis that lawmakers needed to address. She argued these two justices had fallen short of the standards of behavior laid out in the U.S. Constitution.

What are the specific articles of impeachment she introduced? Ocasio-Cortez filed three articles of impeachment against Justice Thomas, alleging that he:

• Failed to disclose financial income, gifts, and reimbursements he’d received;

• Refused to recuse himself from Supreme Court cases where his wife had a legal interest;

• And refused to recuse himself from cases where his wife had a financial interest at stake.

Her articles of impeachment against Justice Alito allege that he:

• Failed to recuse himself from cases in which he had a personal bias or prejudice against a party before the court;

• And failed to disclose financial income, gifts, and reimbursements he’d received while serving on the court.

Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., wrote a letter to Chief Justice John Roberts last week asking what steps the high court or other federal courts would take to investigate accusations of misconduct against the justices. The pair also introduced legislation just days later that would require Supreme Court justices to report any gift they received worth more than $50.

Late last year, all nine Supreme Court Justices signed a code of ethics amid accusations of impropriety. But some lawmakers criticized the code, saying it left it up to the justices to decide whether they’d done anything wrong.

Dig deeper: Listen to Mary Reichard’s report on The World and Everything in It podcast about the debate surrounding the court’s code of ethics.