“Justice Clarence Thomas must resign from the Supreme Court immediately or else be impeached,” a petition from the progressive activism group known as MoveOn asserts — and as of early Saturday afternoon, the petition was quickly approaching 900,000 signatures.
To sign the petition, you have to submit basic information including a zip code, meaning it seems like only U.S.-based individuals would be included. “The right-wing rigged Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade last week, effectively taking away the right to privacy and bodily autonomy that’s been considered legal precedent for the past 50 years,” a message on the petition page says. “Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas—who sided with the majority on overturning Roe—made it clear what’s next: to overturn high court rulings that establish gay rights and contraception rights.”
A concurring opinion Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas released alongside the court’s recent decision to overturn Roe v. Wade stated the court “should reconsider all of this Court’s substantive due process precedents, including Griswold, Lawrence, and Obergefell.” The rulings in those cases protected access to contraception — a critical reproductive health tool, shielded same-sex relationships, and established the federally recognized right to same-sex marriage. No other Justice signed onto the concurring opinion in which Thomas asserted the court should look once again at those critical past cases, but the liberal Justices on the court warned in their own remarks connected to Roe getting overturned that dangers nonetheless remained.
“The first problem with the majority’s account comes from [Thomas’s] concurrence — which makes clear he is not with the program,” an opinion from the court’s liberal Justices stated, adding: “At least one Justice is planning to use the ticket of today’s decision again and again and again.” Their reference to problems with what the conservative majority said concerns the fact that the majority opinion, written by Justice Samuel Alito, asserts that nothing in the opinion “should be understood to cast doubt on precedents that do not concern abortion.” However, Thomas is clearly not inclined to think in the same fashion, and adding additional Justices to the court who think like him could amplify the threat. That assumes Justices such as the Trump appointees who seemed to indicate deference to the precedent set by Roe before later voting to overturn the right to an abortion established in the case aren’t already willing to break with what Alito claimed.
The MoveOn petition also cites the fact Clarence hasn’t recused himself from matters involving the 2020 presidential election and attempts to undercut the outcome despite the involvement of his wife, Ginni, in pushes to overturn Biden’s win. “Thomas’ failure to recuse himself warrants immediate investigation and heightened alarm,” the petition’s webpage says. “And it’s only the latest in a long history of conflicts of interest in the service of a right-wing agenda and mixing his powerful role with his conservative political activism. He has shown he cannot be an impartial justice and is more concerned with covering up his wife’s coup attempts than the health of the Supreme Court.” Read more at this link.
