Markey calls for Clarence Thomas to resign: 'reputation is unsalvageable'

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) on Monday called for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to resign amid controversy over the justice’s financial disclosures and ethical concerns about the nation’s highest court.

“I will say what needs to be said: Clarence Thomas should resign from the Supreme Court of the United States. His reputation is unsalvageable,” Markey said at an event to advocate for Supreme Court reforms.

“It is evident that he cannot judge right from wrong. So why should he be judging the country's most important cases, on its highest court?” the senator added.

Recent reporting from ProPublica found that Texas billionaire Harlan Crow paid for Thomas to take part in luxury vacations over two decades without the justice reporting them. Thomas said later that he was “advised” that he did not need to disclose the trips. 

Another ProPublica report found that Thomas also didn’t disclose a 2014 real estate deal he’d made with the same Republican megadonor. 

Markey joins Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) and a handful of House lawmakers, including Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), in calling for Thomas to leave the court after the reports sparked renewed debate over ethics standards for the justices.

“Justice Thomas should resign - to uphold the Court and American justice. The unavoidable, sickening appearance of impropriety stains trust & credibility in our whole judiciary,” Blumenthal said earlier this month.

Ocasio-Cortez said “this degree of corruption is shocking — almost cartoonish” and called for Thomas to be impeached.

Markey on Monday gathered with Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and others to kick off "the Just Majority bus tour" and push for expanding the court and shoring up ethics standards.

In addition to criticisms about Thomas's ties to Crow, who Markey called "a rich right-wing bad actor pushing a far-right agenda," the senator also criticized Thomas for not recusing himself "on cases about efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, in spite of the fact that his wife was implicated in them."

"We have to ensure that the mockery which Justice Clarence Thomas is actually committing is corrected because it is a violation of public trust," Markey said, adding, "Clarence Thomas is serving on the high court with the highest level of corruption."