More rules for the Department of Defense regarding gifts. The rest of the Federal Government and most State and local government have similar rules.
https://www.hqmc.marines.mil/portals/143/docs/standards_of_conduct.pdf
Common sense and basic morality tell you not to accept gifts. No ethical person would do so.
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Except, of course, the US Supreme Court. Pathetic. Embarrasing. A bunch on non elected lifetime appointed tyrants. This must not stand.
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See a list of all the gifts here.
All told, the number of gifts FTC identified that were accepted by the current nine, plus the eight who’ve left the court since 2004 (Justices Rehnquist, Stevens, O’Connor, Scalia, Kennedy, Souter, Ginsburg and Breyer) is 546, valued at $4,755,147. Adding in Thomas’ 126 likely gifts since his confirmation, that tally comes to 672 gifts valued at $6,592,657.
These numbers are largely based on last year’s groundbreaking work by ProPublica and includes data from stories in the New York Times, L.A. Times, the congressional record, annual disclosures and FTC’s own research, led by law clerks Olivia Rae Okun-Dubitsky and Ashley Alarcon.
“Supreme Court justices should not be accepting gifts, let alone the hundreds of freebies worth millions of dollars they’ve received over the years,” Fix the Court’s Gabe Roth said. “Public servants who make four times the median local salary, and who can make millions writing books on any topic they like, can afford to pay for their own vacations, vehicles, hunting excursions and club memberships — to say nothing of the influence the gift-givers are buying with their ‘generosity.’ The ethics crisis at the Court won’t begin to abate until justices adopt stricter gift acceptance rules.”
WASHINGTON (CN) — A report released Thursday puts numbers to the Supreme Court’s ethics scandals, finding that the justices have received over 300 gifts worth $3 million in the last 20 years.
Judiciary watchdog Fix the Court unveiled a detailed account of the value of the gifts that ignited calls for ethics reform at the court.
"Supreme Court justices should not be accepting gifts, let alone the hundreds of freebies worth millions of dollars they've received over the years," Gabe Roth, executive director at Fix the Court, said in a statement. "Public servants who make four times the median local salary, and who can make millions writing books on any topic they like, can afford to pay for their own vacations, vehicles, hunting excursions and club memberships — to say nothing of the influence the gift-givers are buying with their 'generosity.'”
From January 2004 to December 2023, the nine justices accepted 344 gifts valued at almost $3 million. That total grows to over $4.7 million when adding in 202 additional gifts accepted by the eight justices who have left the court since 2004.
Justice Clarence Thomas has accepted over twice as many gifts as any other justice, with a total of 103 gifts totaling $2,402,310. Fix the Court identified an additional 101 gifts the George H.W. Bush appointee likely received based on news reporting. The additional $1.7 million in gifts brings Thomas’ gift total to over $4 million.
Thomas’ trips on private jets, detailed in reporting from ProPublica, were among the most expensive gifts he accepted. In 2004, the Bush appointee flew on Wayne Huizenga’s personal 737 for two trips to Ft. Lauderdale, Florida. The flights from the billionaire who founded Waste Management and Blockbuster were worth $130,000 each.
In 2007, real estate mogul Harlan Crow paid for a $160,000 yacht cruise Thomas took around the Greek Islands. The next year, health care executive Anthony Welters paid $253,686,the balance on Thomas’ RV loan. Welters also paid for Thomas’ roundtrip flight to Trinidad in 2010, which was worth $97,666.
Thomas’ most expensive gifts were trips to Bohemian Grove. ProPublica confirmed six of these visits worth almost $300,000. Reporting suggested that Thomas was a regular guest of Crow’s at the exclusive club for over two decades, adding $997,500 in likely gifts to his total.
Only 8.5% of the gifts noted by Fix the Court were reported in Thomas’ financial disclosure forms.
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