Trips to lecture in Europe, Latin America and Hawaii. Millions of dollars in book deals. Income from teaching at prestigious law schools.
Supreme Court justices offered a window into some of the perks of being part of the nation’s highest court in their annual financial disclosures, which were released on Tuesday and covered the justices’ activities last year.
Under a federal law passed after the Watergate scandal in the 1970s, the justices must disclose gifts, travel and outside income. There has been increased scrutiny of the disclosures in recent years, particularly after revelations that Justice Clarence Thomas had failed to disclose years of lavish gifts and travel from wealthy friends, including the Texas billionaire Harlan Crow.
Justice Thomas has said he did not believe that he was required to disclose the gifts.
In his latest report, Justice Thomas listed no gifts or private jet travel. In an addendum, however, he wrote that he had “inadvertently omitted” a life insurance policy from prior reports. The policy, he noted, was purchased in July 2001 and terminated last month.
Justice Thomas indicated that the policy covered someone other than himself, and added that “confusion arose on whether the policy needed to be disclosed.”
He did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The forms are only a few pages and provide limited details. But they often give colorful examples of the justices’ lives off the bench.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. disclosed that he was given transportation, lodging and meals on a two-week trip to Ireland last summer, where he taught a course on Supreme Court history for New England Law, a Boston-based law school.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor was gifted travel to Panama, Switzerland and Hawaii to speak and to meet with law students. And Justice Neil M. Gorsuch spent much of July in Europe, teaching in Germany and Portugal.
Under court ethics rules, teaching remains one of the ways that justices can earn outside income, and many of them spend the summer months — when the court is typically in recess — teaching in far-flung places.
The forms also highlight the income that several justices have received from writing and selling books, another way justices can supplement income. The money from books often far eclipses court salaries, which are roughly $300,000.
A majority of the justices have written books. Last year, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson published a best-selling memoir, “Lovely One,” which chronicled her childhood and rise to becoming the first Black woman on the court. The justice disclosed more than $2 million from her book advance and a string of book-related appearances, including in New York, San Francisco and Miami, where she was raised.
Justice Sotomayor and Justice Thomas have also written best-selling memoirs, and Justice Sotomayor has released several children’s books. Justice Sotomayor disclosed that she earned more than $130,000 in book royalties and advances in 2024.
Justice Gorsuch has written several books, including one published last summer in which he argued that Americans were inundated with too many laws and regulations. Justice Gorsuch disclosed about $250,000 in book royalties.
Publishers have announced upcoming memoirs by Justice Amy Coney Barrett and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, but neither disclosed income in the latest reports.
Justice Barrett received a reported $2 million book deal shortly after joining the court. In her financial disclosure for 2021, she disclosed a payment of $425,000. Justice Kavanaugh disclosed $340,000 from his publisher on his 2023 financial form.
Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. did not release his disclosure form on Tuesday. He requested a 90-day extension, according to a spokeswoman for the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, which publishes the disclosures.
Justice Alito typically requests extensions.
Last year, he disclosed receiving music festival tickets from Princess Gloria von Thurn und Taxis, an anti-abortion, anti-immigration provocateur and conservative Catholic with ties to the European far right.
The princess, known in the 1980s for her jeweled tiaras, multicolored mohawk and friendships with celebrities like Michael Jackson and Princess Diana, invited the justice and his wife to stay for free at her 500-room Bavarian palace for her annual musical celebration in the summer of 2023.
She also arranged for them to attend a well-known festival celebrating the German composer Richard Wagner.
The princess had told The Times that she considered the justice a “hero” for his opposition to abortion. Justice Alito wrote the court’s opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which overturned the constitutional right to abortion.
Abbie VanSickle covers the United States Supreme Court for The Times. She is a lawyer and has an extensive background in investigative reporting.
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