Advocacy Group Says Justices May Have Conflict in Campaign Finance Cases

[cal04]

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/us/politics/20koch.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

When the conservative financier Charles Koch sent out invitations for a political retreat in Palm Springs later this month, he highlighted past appearances at the gathering of “notable leaders” like Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court.

A leading liberal group is now trying to use that connection to argue that Mr. Scalia and Mr. Thomas should disqualify themselves from hearing campaign finance cases because they may be biased toward Mr. Koch, a billionaire who has been a major player in financing conservative causes.

The group, Common Cause, filed a petition with the Justice Department on Wednesday asking it to investigate potential conflicts by Justices Scalia and Thomas and move for their disqualification from the landmark Citizens United case, in which the court last year lifted a ban on corporate spending on political campaigns. Common Cause also cited the role of Mr. Thomas’s wife, Virginia Thomas, in forming a conservative political group opposed to the Obama administration as grounds for his disqualification.

The petition is a new tack for opponents of the court’s decision in the Citizens United case. Common Cause, by its own acknowledgment, faces a difficult task in getting the justices’ to remove themselves from the case and seeking to have the Citizens United decision itself vacated.


http://www.commoncause.org/site/pp.asp?c=dkLNK1MQIwG&b=4741359

[enough]

1. k&r (nt)

[Doctor_J]

2. Which might be important if this weren't the most corrupt SCOTUS in US history

These people flaunt their corruption. Seriesly, who is Common Cause going to appeal to? The current DoJ doesn't have the stomach to fight the right wing.

[malaise]

3. More corrupt than Rehnquist's court for example

That one pulled off a coup.

[hootinholler]

4. Who can they appeal to?

The House of Representatives.

At some point we will have a majority with balls.

-Hoot