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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLeaked Emails Show Justice Clarence Thomas's Wife Pushing Travel Ban
Leaked Emails Show Justice Clarence Thomass Wife Pushing Travel BanIn leaked emails, Ginni Thomas asked for advice on how to organize in favor of Trumps travel ban. But by doing so, she may have inadvertently made it harder for the executive order to survive the Supreme Court
Justice Clarence Thomass wife is organizing in support of President Donald Trumps agenda. And it might make her husbands life a little complicated.
In an email sent to a conservative listserv on Feb. 13 and obtained by The Daily Beast, Ginni Thomas asked an interesting question: How could she organize activists to push for Trumps policies?
What is the best way to, with minimal costs, set up a daily text capacity for a ground up-grassroots army for pro-Trump daily action items to push back against the lefts resistance efforts who are trying to make America ungovernable? she wrote.
I see the left has Daily Action @YourDailyAction and their Facebook likes are up to 61K, she continued.
She then linked to a Washington Post story about the group.
But there are some grassroots activists, who seem beyond the Republican party or the conservative movement, who wish to join the fray on social media for Trump and link shields and build momentum, she wrote. I met with a house load of them yesterday and we want a daily textable tool to start Suggestions?
the rest:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/02/16/leaked-emails-show-justice-clarence-thomas-s-wife-pushing-travel-ban.html
Sherman A1
(38,958 posts)the travel ban needs to be constitutional and legal in order to survive. What was done was clearly not so.
DK504
(3,847 posts)WTF is she doing thrusting herself into Executive politics? Did Clarence tell her what to do??
JHB
(37,163 posts)From 2013:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/ginni-thomas-groundswell-conflict-interest
Her fierce political advocacy with Groundswell revives conflict of interest questions surrounding her husband.
Virginia "Ginni" Thomas is no ordinary Supreme Court spouse. Unlike Maureen Scalia, mother of nine, or the late Martin Ginsburg, mild-mannered tax law professor who was good in the kitchen, Thomas came from the world of bare-knuckled partisan politics. Over the years, she has enmeshed herself ever more deeply in the world of political advocacyall the while creating a heap of conflict of interest concerns surrounding her husband, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Her role in Groundswell, the coalition of conservatives waging a "30 front war" against progressives and the GOP establishment that was revealed by Mother Jones on Thursday, revives questions about the propriety of Thomas' activism on issues that have or could become the subject of Supreme Court cases.
Conflict of interest issues were first aired during Clarence Thomas' confirmation hearings in 1991, when critics argued that Ginni Thomas' political work might compromise her husband's objectivity. At that time, her political resume included stints as a Capitol Hill aide to a Republican congressman; a staffer at the US Chamber of Commerce, where she fought the Family and Medical Leave Act; and as a political appointee at the Labor Department during the first Bush administration. Thomas didn't leave politics after her husband was confirmed. "I did not give up my First Amendment rights when my husband became a justice of the Supreme Court," she has said in the past. She would later return to the Hill as a staffer to House majority leader Rep. Dick Armey (R-Texas) and work for the Heritage Foundation, the conservative think tank. But in those jobs, Thomas kept a relatively low profile.
That changed around the same time that the tea party exploded in American politics, and Thomas became an outspoken member of the movement. In late 2009, Thomas founded the political advocacy group Liberty Central, which would later become a fierce player in the opposition to health care form. Detractors pointed out that Liberty Central was a potential vehicle for people with interests before the Supreme Court to make anonymous donations that might influence her husband.
The group was formed with a $500,000 anonymous donation that came as the Supreme Court was considering Citizens United, a case that ultimately resulted in loosening the restrictions on corporate giving to political campaigns. The anonymous donor was later revealed to be Harlan Crow, the Texas real estate developer. Crow was also a friend of Clarence Thomas', and he was later linked to a scandal involving the justice's failure to publicly disclose gifts from the developer and trips aboard his private jet. (It didn't help that Justice Thomas had also failed to include his wife's $150,000 annual salary from Liberty Central on his financial disclosure forms, which he later had to amend.) In January 2011, the good-government group Common Cause asked the Justice Department to investigate whether Justice Thomas should have recused himself from Citizens United based on his wife's role at Liberty Central. (Common Cause also asked the IRS to revoke Liberty Central's nonprofit status. Nothing came of either request.)
What is "Groudswell" you ask?
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/07/groundswell-rightwing-group-ginni-thomas
Ginni Thomas, Allen West, and a crew of conservative activists and journalists have formed a hush-hush coalition to battle progressivesand Karl Rove.
Believing they are losing the messaging war with progressives, a group of prominent conservatives in Washingtonincluding the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and journalists from Breitbart News and the Washington Examinerhas been meeting privately since early this year to concoct talking points, coordinate messaging, and hatch plans for "a 30 front war seeking to fundamentally transform the nation," according to documents obtained by Mother Jones.
Dubbed Groundswell, this coalition convenes weekly in the offices of Judicial Watch, the conservative legal watchdog group. During these hush-hush sessions and through a Google group, the members of Groundswellincluding aides to congressional Republicanscook up battle plans for their ongoing fights against the Obama administration, congressional Democrats, progressive outfits, and the Republican establishment and "clueless" GOP congressional leaders. They devise strategies for killing immigration reform, hyping the Benghazi controversy, and countering the impression that the GOP exploits racism. And the Groundswell gang is mounting a behind-the-scenes organized effort to eradicate the outsize influence of GOP über-strategist/pundit Karl Rove within Republican and conservative ranks. (For more on Groundswell's "two front war" against Rovea major clash on the rightclick here.)
One of the influential conservatives guiding the group is Virginia "Ginni" Thomas, a columnist for the Daily Caller and a tea party consultant and lobbyist. Other Groundswell members include John Bolton, the former UN ambassador; Frank Gaffney, the president of the Center for Security Policy; Ken Blackwell and Jerry Boykin of the Family Research Council; Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch; Gayle Trotter, a fellow at the Independent Women's Forum; Catherine Engelbrecht and Anita MonCrief of True the Vote; Allen West, the former GOP House member; Sue Myrick, also a former House GOPer; Diana Banister of the influential Shirley and Banister PR firm; and Max Pappas, a top aide to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).
Among the conveners listed in an invitation to a May 8 meeting of Groundswell were Stephen Bannon, executive chairman of Breitbart News Network; Dan Bongino, a former Secret Service agent who resoundingly lost a Maryland Senate race last year (and is now running for a House seat); Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the Federalist Society; Sandy Rios, a Fox News contributor; Lori Roman, a former executive director of the American Legislative Exchange Council; and Austin Ruse, the head of the Catholic Family and Human Rights Institute. Conservative journalists and commentators participating in Groundswell have included Breitbart News reporters Matthew Boyle and Mike Flynn, Washington Examiner executive editor Mark Tapscott, and National Review contributor Michael James Barton.
mdbl
(4,976 posts)Not when you have the magic (R) next to your name, as Bill Maher would say.
Cha
(297,799 posts)to the Daily Beast? Certainly not wikileaks
LisaL
(44,974 posts)Anybody on the list could have leaked it.
Cha
(297,799 posts)so it seems like it was a friendly betrayal. How good since it might compromise the situation..
" But by doing so, she may have inadvertently made it harder for the executive order to survive the Supreme Court"
she deserves some long overdue karma
BumRushDaShow
(129,662 posts)that is how he rolls - ethics be damned.
brer cat
(24,625 posts)He considers himself exempt from conflicts of interests just like baby fuhrer does.
MyOwnPeace
(16,940 posts)Thomas and the late (but not "late" soon enough!) Scalia (may he rest in peace - NOT!) continually refused to exempt themselves from obvious "conflicts of interest" cases.
grantcart
(53,061 posts)I have a feeling that the CJ would like to send the President and unanimous decision to signal strong displeasure on constitutional issues and to stop attacking the costs in general.
BumRushDaShow
(129,662 posts)Drumpf would double-down via twitter and stomp and fume.
But at this point, a case would need to actually reach them in order for them to do that and it seems that there is wavering on whether to appeal their current fiasco to the SCOTUS or rewrite it.
cstanleytech
(26,334 posts)give the Repugnants the excuse they need to remove him and put Pence in his place which was probably the plan all along as I think they knew Trump was unfit but they were probably thinking that they wouldnt have to do it for atleast a year or two.
BumRushDaShow
(129,662 posts)He is being used by the GOP and by Putin. And agree that both mistakenly thought they could keep him "sane" (or at least "controlled" long enough to get their draconian agendas enacted, but they are in for a rude awakening!
Angry Dragon
(36,693 posts)BumRushDaShow
(129,662 posts)rpannier
(24,342 posts)Though I'd be curious how CJ Roberts or AJ Kennedy would feel about this
They might either strong arm (verbally, not physically) into stepping aside or they may intentionally vote against him if he refuses to recuse
BumRushDaShow
(129,662 posts)and whether it could move the final decision one way or the other (outside of a unanimous 8-0 or a 4-4 tie) - i.e., 5-3 . I did a quick google and Thomas has actually recused himself from a case at least once.
bullimiami
(13,108 posts)tanyev
(42,636 posts)That word doesn't mean what you think it means, Ginni.
lostnfound
(16,193 posts)JudyM
(29,294 posts)a held-her-nose tRump voter, was lamenting the crowds of protestors not giving him a chance to try to fix what's wrong with our political system. Like we're the ones hurting democracy.
kwassa
(23,340 posts)After all, nobody governs him.
ck4829
(35,094 posts)sarah FAILIN
(2,857 posts)I want to know whose house and who was there. If theirs, then...
CK_John
(10,005 posts)BeckyDem
(8,361 posts)JudyM
(29,294 posts)BeckyDem
(8,361 posts)Thank you for the welcome, JudyM
MiniMe
(21,719 posts)BeckyDem
(8,361 posts)LISTSERV
I was never on JournoList, and it has always sounded like an unworkable idea to mehow can you expect a bunch of reporters to keep all those discussions secret? (Blogger David Weigel, whose leaked JournoList e-mails led to his resignation at the Washington Post, was recently hired by Slate; I've never met Weigel or even e-mailed with him.) At the same time, I understood Klein's impulse. That impulse being: Listservs are wonderful! For a lot of topics, e-mail listsespecially off-the-record listsare better than Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr at fostering a sense of community and generating deep, thoughtful conversations.
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2010/08/the_joy_of_listservs.html
MiniMe
(21,719 posts)Ginny posted her comments on a listserv, that is not a private means of communication, it is available to a wide number of people. Listserv may not be the best way to get an answer, but it is a public way to ask for info. I have been on listserv's in the past, and everybody sees everything that people put on there. It is old technology, message boards are a much better way to keep track of what is posted. Can you imagine not having any organization or order to everything that is posted at DU?
BeckyDem
(8,361 posts)private. Thanks.
d_r
(6,907 posts)you send an email to the list and the mail is sent to all members of the list.
Corgigal
(9,291 posts)After the brownish colored human get booted, what color does she think is next? We're all on the list, some just can't imagine that they are.
LisaM
(27,843 posts)Which tells you everything you need to know about this crowd.
putitinD
(1,551 posts)Honeycombe8
(37,648 posts)As I recall, she's been caught doing something like this before.
Activism by a Justice's spouse, on a matter that is likely to reach the Supreme Court? That must be unethical on some level. She's still a citizen, but surely there are some limitations when you are married to a S.Ct. Justice?
cstanleytech
(26,334 posts)Nonetheless he should recuse himself from the muslim ban case should it go to SCOTUS to avoid any potential ethic issues himself but he isnt required to by law, sucks though.
joet67
(624 posts)that comes before the court would really be coming up against a 4-3 court then, wouldn't it? At a minimum. I can't remember now the extent of her activism, but if memory serves, Mrs. Thomas may have just handed us a much-needed gift.