GOP senators call on Supreme Court to ‘update’ ethics oversight

Partisan cannon fire dominated Senate Democrats’ high-profile hearing Tuesday on Supreme Court ethics, but behind the bluster, some Republicans acknowledged the high court needed to address a spate of controversies about justices’ conduct. The Senate Judiciary Committee hosted the hearing to call for more formal ethical standards at the high court. Chair Dick Durbin opened the session by recounting recent reports that Justice Clarence Thomas accepted luxury travel via private jet and yacht from a Texas developer without declaring most of the hospitality on his financial disclosures and sold his mother’s home to the same developer without reporting the transaction.