![]() ![]() Then, as the public cost of hosting the event soared almost tenfold, a Sotomayor aide emailed with a different, urgent concern: She said the organizers did not buy enough copies of the justice’s book, which attendees had to purchase or have on hand in order to meet Sotomayor after her talk. They put in long hours and accommodated the shifting requests of Sotomayor’s court staff. In 2019, as Sotomayor traveled the country to promote her new children’s book, “Just Ask!,” library and community college officials in Portland, Oregon, jumped at the chance to host an event. Justices also lent the allure of their high office to partisan activity. Besides book sales, appearances by the justices were used in hopes of raising money at schools, which often invited major contributors to the events. The documents obtained by AP show that the justices’ conduct spans their conservative-liberal split. “When (Sotomayor) is invited to participate in a book program, Chambers staff recommends the number of books (for an organization to order) based on the size of the audience so as not to disappoint attendees who may anticipate books being available at an event,” the court said. In a statement, the Supreme Court said it works with the justices and their staff to ensure they are “complying with judicial ethics guidance for such visits.” Lower federal court judges are also instructed to not “lend the prestige of the judicial office to advance” their “private interests.” ![]() That is conduct prohibited for members of Congress and the executive branch, who are barred under ethics rules from using government resources, including staff, for personal financial gain. Supreme Court staffers have been deeply involved in organizing speaking engagements intended to sell books. “The problem at the Supreme Court is there’s no one there to say whether this is wrong.” “This is one of the most basic tenets of ethics laws that protects taxpayer dollars from misuse,” said Kedric Payne, a former deputy chief counsel at the Office of Congressional Ethics and current general counsel for the Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan government watchdog group in Washington. But when it comes to promoting her literary career, Sotomayor is free to do what other government officials cannot because the Supreme Court does not have a formal code of conduct, leaving the nine justices to largely write and enforce their own rules. In her case, the documents reveal repeated examples of taxpayer-funded court staff performing tasks for the justice’s book ventures, which workers in other branches of government are barred from doing. The resulting tens of thousands of pages of documents offer a rare look at Sotomayor and her fellow justices beyond their official duties. Details of those events, largely out of public view, were obtained by The Associated Press through more than 100 open records requests to public institutions. Sotomayor’s staff has often prodded public institutions that have hosted the justice to buy her memoir or children’s books, works that have earned her at least $3.7 million since she joined the court in 2009. She has benefited, too - from schools’ purchases of hundreds, sometimes thousands, of the books she has written over the years. WASHINGTON (AP) - For colleges and libraries seeking a boldfaced name for a guest lecturer, few come bigger than Sonia Sotomayor, the Supreme Court justice who rose from poverty in the Bronx to the nation’s highest court. ![]()
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