Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito says that he has "a pretty good idea" of who leaked the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization draft decision last year.
"I personally have a pretty good idea who is responsible, but that's different from the level of proof that is needed to name somebody," Alito said, according to the Wall Street Journal. "It was a part of an effort to prevent the Dobbs draft ... from becoming the decision of the court. And that's how it was used for those six weeks by people on the outside — as part of the campaign to try to intimidate the court."
The draft was leaked in early May last year, revealing that the high court was poised to overturn Roe v. Wade, but the official decision was released more than a month later.
"Those of us who were thought to be in the majority, thought to have approved my draft opinion, were really targets of assassination," Alito said, according to the Journal. "It was rational for people to believe that they might be able to stop the decision in Dobbs by killing one of us."
"I don't feel physically unsafe, because we now have a lot of protection," he said, noting that he is "driven around in basically a tank, and I'm not really supposed to go anyplace by myself without the tank and my members of the police force."
He said that the leak "created an atmosphere of suspicion and distrust. We worked through it, and last year we got our work done. This year, I think, we're trying to get back to normal operations as much as we can. ... But it was damaging."
The decision returned to states the authority to decide how to handle the issue of abortion and whether to prohibit it.
"Roe was egregiously wrong from the start. Its reasoning was exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences," Alito wrote in the opinion. "The Constitution does not prohibit the citizens of each State from regulating or prohibiting abortion. Roe and Casey arrogated that authority. We now overrule those decisions and return that authority to the people and their elected representatives."
An investigation into the leak failed to produce the perpetrator or determine how Politico had obtained the draft opinion.
"At this time, based on a preponderance of the evidence standard, it is not possible to determine the identity of any individual who may have disclosed the document or how the draft opinion ended up with Politico," the Supreme Court Marshal's report stated earlier this year.
Alito, who was nominated to serve on the Supreme Court by President George W. Bush, has served on the high court since early 2006.
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Mike Pompeo claimed during an appearance on Fox News Channel's "Outnumbered" that Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff of California has leaked classified information.
Pompeo, who served as CIA director and then as secretary of state during former President Donald Trump's tenure, said during his time in those roles, he knows that Schiff "leaked classified information that had been provided to him."
Pompeo said that when information was supplied to Schiff and his staff, that information showed up in places it should not have, "with alarming regularity."
Adam Schiff should be nowhere near classified information: Pompeo www.youtube.com
House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has rejected the appointments of Schiff and Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) to sit on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, on which they both previously served and which Schiff has previously chaired.
\u201cI have rejected the appointments of Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell for the House Intelligence Committee.\n\nI am committed to returning the @HouseIntel Committee to one of genuine honesty and credibility that regains the trust of the American people.\u201d— Kevin McCarthy (@Kevin McCarthy) 1674607627
Pompeo has indicated that he is mulling the possibility of a 2024 presidential run, while Schiff has said that he will consider running for U.S. Senate if Sen. Dianne Feinstein decides to retire.
Meta announced on Wednesday that it plans to reinstate "Trump's Facebook and Instagram accounts in the coming weeks."
Schiff described the social media company's move as "dangerous."
"Trump incited an insurrection. And tried to stop the peaceful transfer of power. He’s shown no remorse. No contrition. Giving him back access to a social media platform to spread his lies and demagoguery is dangerous," Schiff tweeted. "@facebook caved, giving him a platform to do more harm."
Trump, who had long been expected to announce another White House run, officially announced in November that he is running for president again.
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Supreme Court Marshal Gail A. Curley said in a statement on Friday that she spoke to the justices amid the investigation into a draft opinion leak, but she never requested that they sign sworn affidavits.
"During the course of the investigation, I spoke with each of the Justices, several on multiple occasions. The Justices actively cooperated in this iterative process, asking questions and answering mine. I followed up on all credible leads, none of which implicated the Justices or their spouses. On this basis, I did not believe that it was necessary to ask the Justices to sign sworn affidavits," Curley said in the statement.
The marshal's report on the investigation noted that the probe failed to uncover who was responsible for the leak of the Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization draft opinion. In May 2022, Politico published the draft, which revealed that the Supreme Court was poised to strike down the 1973 Roe v. Wade abortion ruling — the court's official opinion released in June 2022 did, in fact, overturnRoe.
The report on the leak investigation stated that "all personnel who had access to the draft opinion signed sworn affidavits affirming they did not disclose the draft opinion nor know anything about who did." The report also noted, "A few of those interviewed admitted to telling their spouses about the draft opinion or vote count, so they annotated their affidavits to that effect."
But the leak remains a mystery, with the report indicating that the investigation did not determine how the Politico obtained the draft.
"At this time, based on a preponderance of the evidence standard, it is not possible to determine the identity of any individual who may have disclosed the document or how the draft opinion ended up with Politico," the report read. "While investigators and the Court’s IT experts cannot absolutely rule out a hack, the evidence to date reveals no suggestion of improper outside access. Investigators also cannot eliminate the possibility that the draft opinion was inadvertently or negligently disclosed – for example, by being left in a public space either inside or outside the building."
Slate senior writer Mark Joseph Stern suggested that the marshal had not furnished a good rationale for choosing not to ask the justices to sign affidavits. "If the marshal was so certain the justices weren't involved with the leak, she could've simply asked them to sign a sworn affidavit saying so, just like everyone else. It would not have been difficult. If she has a good reason for refusing to do so, she has not provided it!" Stern tweeted.
\u201cIf the marshal was so certain the justices weren't involved with the leak, she could've simply asked them to sign a sworn affidavit saying so, just like everyone else. It would not have been difficult. If she has a good reason for refusing to do so, she has not provided it!\u201d— Mark Joseph Stern (@Mark Joseph Stern) 1674250172
"The logic is odd: Curley says she saw no reason to ask the Justices to sign affidavits because there were no credible leads implicating the Justices or their spouses. Were there credible leads implicating all of the Court employees who *were* asked to sign affidavits?" tweeted Steven Mazie, whose Twitter profile indicates that he covers the high court for the Economist and teaches political science.
"Note Curley's use of the phrase 'spoke with.' Her report, in contrast, repeatedly used the terms 'interview' and 'formal interview' to describe her questioning of court staff. Not using those terms here suggests that her conversations with the justices were much more informal," SCOTUSblog editor James Romoser tweeted.
\u201cThat Curley "spoke with" the justices "during" the investigation is unsurprising. But this statement strengthens the inference that the investigators did not scrutinize the justices at the same level as they scrutinized everyone else with access to the draft.\u201d— James Romoser (@James Romoser) 1674251644
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