Courts

Ginni Thomas's Messy Post-Election Behavior Finally Earns Her Jan. 6th Committee Invite

Ginni's correspondence with the Coups 4 Dummies lawyer takes the spotlight.

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Leading Conservatives Gather For Annual CPAC Event In National Harbor, Maryland

(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Ginni Thomas is no stranger to controversy — generally of her own making. A right wing operative for many years, which might cause consternation for her husband given his outsized role in our system of government, but goodness knows his sense of irony is dead.

But Ginni’s role post-2020 election is where awareness of her machinations went from Court watchers to the general public. We know about the unhinged series of text messages — 29! — between Ginni and Mark Meadows, Trump’s Chief of Staff, over the dawning realization that Donald Trump had lost the presidential election to Joe Biden.

Don’t worry, despite his wife’s involvement, Clarence Thomas went on to hear a case about the January 6th committee where he was the lone dissent when the Court rejected Trump’s efforts to block the release of presidential records to the committee. Yes, everyone would — at a minimum — love for him to recuse himself from similar cases in the future, but the lack of ethics rules that apply to SCOTUS make that a wish, not a reality.

But Ginni’s role in trying to subvert the will of the voters was even larger than that. As tweeted by Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern, she also pressured Republican legislators in Arizona to ignore the vote in selecting their state’s electors. (Also, for the record, Stern does the Lord’s work keeping everyone informed on all the wildness that is Ginni Thomas.)

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And now there’s new reporting from the Washington Post revealing Ginni’s correspondence with John Eastman — affectionately known around these parts as the Coups 4 Dummies lawyer given his penchant for wacky (and dangerous) plans to seize power post-election.

And while the contents of these emails have not yet been revealed, the January 6th committee may want to speak with Mrs. Thomas:

The emails show that Thomas’s efforts to overturn the election were more extensive than previously known, two of the people said. The three declined to provide details and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

The committee’s members and staffers are now discussing whether to spend time during their public hearings exploring Ginni Thomas’s role in the attempt to overturn the outcome of the 2020 election, the three people said. The Washington Post previously reported that the committee had not sought an interview with Thomas and was leaning against pursuing her cooperation with its investigation.

The two people said the emails were among documents obtained by the committee and reviewed recently. Last week, a federal judge ordered Eastman to turn more than 100 documents over to the committee. Eastman had tried to block the release of those and other documents by arguing that they were privileged communications and therefore should be protected.

Oh look, here are the consequences of Gianni’s actions:

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This is certainly a fascinating turn of events.

But remember, unless the Supreme Court’s ethics rules are changed, Clarence Thomas still has the ability to adjudicate cases no matter his wife’s involvement in the underlying facts.

Kathryn Rubino is a Senior Editor at Above the Law, host of The Jabot podcast, and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. AtL tipsters are the best, so please connect with her. Feel free to email her with any tips, questions, or comments and follow her on Twitter (@Kathryn1).

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