Two Supreme Court justices did not recuse themselves from cases that came before the court over the past decade involving a publishing company that’s paid them in lucrative book deals.
In two separate copyright infringement cases concerning the publishing conglomerate Penguin Random House, the high court declined to take up the appeals, with the court saying in 2013 that it wouldn’t hear the first case, and the second case being turned away from the court in 2019 and again in 2020. In both cases, the publisher won at the lower court level, and those decisions stood.
Liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who joined the court in 2009 and has been paid millions of dollars from the publisher over the years, declined to recuse herself in all three instances.
Conservative Justice Neil Gorsuch, who joined the court in 2017 and also has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in book deals with the publisher, declined to disqualify himself from the more recent case when it came before the court for consideration.
The Supreme Court has come under intense scrutiny in recent weeks following a series of reports on ethical lapses among some justices related to a lack of transparency around their financial disclosures. Watchdog groups have been especially focused on the court’s recusal practices, an area they say is ripe for reform given that no mechanism exists for ensuring a justice won’t participate in a case in which they might have a conflict.
The Supreme Court did not respond for comment.
The court does not typically say publicly how a justice voted in a decision over whether to take up an appeal, but it does briefly note when a recusal has occurred.
In both cases, former liberal Justice Stephen Breyer, who also has received book royalties from the publisher, recused himself.
But Gabe Roth, executive director of Fix…
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