Supreme Court justices don’t have a code of ethics. Hundreds of judges say

Most judges across the U.S. said the Supreme Court justices should be bound by an ethics code. Many were shocked to find out that they aren’t.
Among those judges who responded against requiring such a code, there were worries about who might enforce it.
The question comes amid repeated reports of ethical lapses among judges and as the nation’s highest court is expected to announce more than a dozen decisions in the next few weeks on issues including abortion, guns, immigration and the environment.

Hundreds of judges across the United States said U.S. Supreme Court justices should be bound by a code of ethics – and many said they were shocked to find out that wasn’t already the case.

The National Judicial College surveyed judges across the nation on whether the Supreme Court should be held to a higher standard. The survey came amid a contentious and high-profile U.S. Supreme Court calendar that has involved questions of bias, as well as investigations into Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’ family ties to the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

The Supreme Court is expected to announce more than a dozen decisions in the next few weeks, including on abortion, guns, immigration and the environment. A majority of Americans – about 55% – said they disapprove of the job the highest court is doing, according to a Marquette Law School national poll in May. Americans’ opinions on the court have dropped significantly from 58% approval in a Gallup poll in July 2020 to 40% in September 2021 – the worst Gallup has measured in its polling on the nation’s highest court in more than two decades.

Meanwhile, the ongoing Jan. 6 committee hearings have highlighted the alleged efforts by Virginia “Ginni” Thomas – a longtime conservative activist married to Justice Thomas – to help overturn the 2020 election. Justice Thomas chose not to recuse himself from a case about whether President Donald Trump’s White House records should be turned over to the committee. The January decision was nearly unanimous: Only Thomas disagreed.

Since then, news outlets have reported that Ginni Thomas sent text messages to Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and emails to Trump campaign attorney, John Eastman, as part of her alleged efforts to try to overturn the 2020 election.

More than 97% of the judges roughly 860 judges who responded to a June survey by the judicial college, a nonprofit and nonpartisan institution that educates judges of all types from all over the country, responded “yes” to the question of whether the justices should be bound by a code of conduct, while nearly 3%, or 24 judges, said “no.”