The SuprememCourt - Bought And Paid For

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Advocate tells lawmakers of ‘stealth’ efforts to influence Supreme Court - Gifted Link

Evangelical minister Robert L. Schenck recruited wealthy Christian couples to serve as “stealth missionaries” at the Supreme Court for about two decades, forging friendships with conservative justices to “bolster” their views, particularly on abortion, Schenck told the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday.

“Our overarching goals were to gain insight into the conservative justices’ thinking and to shore up their resolve to render solid, unapologetic opinions,” Schenck said, describing the mission of the influence campaign he dubbed “Operation Higher Court.”

In written testimony, Schenck, who in recent years has broken with the religious right over issues including abortion and gun rights, said he encouraged his recruits to use tactics like donations to the Supreme Court Historical Society to meet justices — and to parlay those encounters into deeper relationships to achieve their objectives. Some recruits wrote amicus briefs in cases before the court, his testimony says.

The testimony included allegations Schenck has made previously to Rolling Stone, Politico and the New York Times.

About Schenck’s efforts, Sherman said in his prepared testimony that “when people buy this level of access, it creates among the American people the powerful impression that they are buying influence. And that, in turn, feeds into the crises of confidence and legitimacy that threaten the very foundations of the judiciary.”
Schenck told the Times last month that Operation Higher Court succeeded in breaching the court’s code of silence, alleging that “stealth missionaries” Gayle and Don Wright learned the outcome of a high-profile 2014 religious freedom case while dining at Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr.’s house, before the opinion was released. The Wrights then shared that information with Schenck, he said.

Alito has strenuously denied that he or his wife shared any information about the outcome of Hobby Lobby v. Burwell, and Gayle Wright has denied that she learned about the outcome from them. (Don Wright is deceased.)

Jordan sought to undermine Schenck’s credibility as a witness Thursday by getting him to admit that some details in a book Schenck wrote about his work connected to the court were inaccurate. “You got the key detail wrong and now you remember an additional detail,” Jordan said after displaying a poster with text from Schenck’s book. “We’re supposed to take your word over Justice Alito’s word, over Gayle Wright’s word?”

Well worth a read.