Jackson also accepted four tickets worth nearly $4,000 from Beyoncé to one of her concerts, and two pieces of art worth $12,500 to display in her chambers.
“Justice Jackson is Crazy in Love with Beyoncé’s music. Who isn’t?” said court spokeswoman Patricia McCabe.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor reported a star turn as a cartoon character on the PBS children’s show “Alma’s Way,” an animated series about a Puerto Rican girl and her family from the Bronx. The justice was paid about $1,900 for voice work on one episode in which she played herself.
The reports show several justices earning additional income from teaching at law schools and accepting free travel to speak at events at universities and legal organizations.
Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. was granted an extension to file his report, as he has received in past years.
The off-the-bench activities of Supreme Court justices have been scrutinized and criticized in the last year following reports by ProPublica and other media outlets that Thomas failed for many years to disclose luxury vacations and private jet travel funded by Crow, an influential Republican donor.
In his report last year, Thomas disclosed for the first time Crow’s purchase of three properties from the justice’s family years earlier — transactions also reported by ProPublica and which ethics experts had said should have been disclosed when they occurred.
He also reported at that time free private jet travel he received the previous year, saying a recent clarification to the judiciary’s ethics policies meant such reporting was now required — though he continued to say it was not required to report such travel in previous years.
Democratic lawmakers and transparency advocates asked the judiciary’s policymaking body last year to review Thomas’s reporting practices, claiming that he might have violated the Ethics in Government Act. At the Judicial Conference meeting in March, the head of the conference said a committee is still examining the allegations from lawmakers.
Thomas’s 2023 report released Friday includes food and lodging in 2019 during trips to Indonesia and the Bohemian Grove club in California, both paid for by Crow and included in ProPublica’s reporting. The justice said he had “inadvertently omitted” the information in past reports and was amending the record “consistent with the review of prior filings.” He did not list travel to and from each place.
Federal ethics law requires top officials from all branches of government, including the justices, to file annual disclosures listing investments, gifts, outside income and the source of spousal income so that the public can assess potential conflicts of interest. Officials from the legislative and executive branch also have more stringent requirements.
As of January, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. earns an annual salary of $312,200, while associate justices each earn $298,500.The judiciary’s rules limit justices to “outside earned income” of no more than about $32,000 per year, which many collect through teaching positions.
But book-writing payments do not count as outside income, allowing justices to enter into lucrative contracts with publishers. At least four justices have forthcoming books about their lives and the law. Reports released Friday show Kavanaugh is at work on a book, for which he has so far received $340,000. A court spokesman confirmed a report in Axios that Kavanaugh is writing a legal memoir.
Jackson received an $893,750 advance for her upcoming memoir, “Lovely One.” The book, which is slated to hit shelves later this year, traces “her family’s ascent from segregation to her confirmation on America’s highest court within the span of one generation,” according to the publisher’s site.
Gorsuch received $250,000 in royalties from the publisher HarperCollins, which is slated to release a book he co-authored with a former law clerk in August. “Over Ruled” will examine the profusion of laws in the United States and the “human toll so much law can carry for ordinary Americans.”
This is a developing story. It will be updated.
Aaron Schaffer contributed to this report.
