WASHINGTON – Two members of the Senate Judiciary Committee are asking the Justice Department to provide information about where Supreme Court justices have traveled, asserting that the disclosure would improve transparency on the high court.
“The justices of our highest court are subject to the lowest standards of transparency of any senior officials across the federal government,” wrote Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and John Kennedy, R-La., in a June 4 letter made public Tuesday.
The request is directed at the U.S. Marshals Service, which provides judicial security – including assisting with security for Supreme Court justices when they travel domestically outside of Washington, D.C., the senators wrote in the letter.
Outside groups have pressed the court for additional travel disclosures. That push received renewed attention after the late Associate Justice Antonin Scalia died in 2016 at a Texas ranch owned by an attorney who previously had business at the court. The owner told the Washington Post then that Scalia was a guest and, like all the other guests at his ranch, did not pay for his stay.
Like others in the government, the justices do disclose trips that are reimbursed by outside entities. Associate Justice Stephen Breyer, for instance, frequently notes his travel to New York to judge the Pritzker Architecture Prize, paid for by a foundation that sponsors that award. Other justice routinely note their travel to speak at law schools.
But outside…
