about this. dahlia, good to see you. thank you for being here. this story gets stranger and stranger by the day, but what we didn t get to talk about last night when we went in depth was leonard leo. this guy is the where s waldo of conservative justices. he s always around. he s in the picture, he s there. so to the extent this was not a random fishing trip the guy in the middle, ostensibly the guy always in the middle is leonard leo. right, he s the travel agent who has no interest in reshaping the court, to be sure. he just likes traveling with justices and billionaires. i mean it s really amazing that quote you just read, that statement he gave to propublica talking about the woke dark money left here, and the idea that he doesn t have an interest in reshaping the court, i mean the reason the court is hearing those cases we talked about at the beginning rehearing
affirmative action and reliving denying service to lgbtq customers, that s because he reshaped the court. just to be clear leonard leo and the federalist society prepared lists of judges that donald trump could pick from, prevetted to say that conservatives will approve of these people if you pick them. leonard leo is not a casualty observer to the shaping of the supreme court of the united states of america. he is possibly the guy whose thumb has most been on the scale. not only that, but he brags about it. this is something that he has been lauded for, feted for, given awards that praised don megan. this is a thing that, you know, he gives elaborate interviews to the washington post, to the new yorker saying i m the guy, i did this. and the idea that he is then in photos with people and he says, oh, we re not talking about the business of the court, it s super weird that i m sitting here with clarence thomas and
democrats calling for greater oversight on the judicial body. we cited think statements that billionaire gop, harlan crow, paid for thomas s nephew to attend boarding school. that same day, the washington post detailed correspondents in 2012, between former vice president of the federal society, leonard leo, and then kellyanne conway. that kellyanne conway. citing documents at msnbc has not independently confirmed, the post says that they instructed conway to pay $25,000. to affirm belonging to justice thomas s wife, conservative activist, ginni thomas. the thomas s have yet to respond to our request for comment. we are told the post that the concern was for the promises
rare statement responding to the reporting that he and his wife were subsidized for lavish vacations and he never disclosed them, thomas says early in his tenure with the court, he sought guidance from his colleagues and others in the judiciary and quote was advised that this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends who did not have business before the court was not reportable. it s woefully inadequate statement, it leaves more questions that it answers both about the justice. in whichever judges are advising him and it should be investigated the investigative news organization propublica reports that justice thomas and his wife, conservative activist jenny thomas, have gone on several luxury trips subsidized by harlan crow, a dallas businessman with deep pockets who is a big republican donor, the report says they ve stayed at several properties owned by crow and traveled around on his super yacht and his private jet. we found this has been going on for more than 20 yea
inspite of what they re saying inspite of what senator tom cotton is saying and others, we re going to celebrate that brittney griner is coming home, that she will be home eating stuffing and turkey with her family, if she eats turkey, that we re going to be celebrating and understanding the power of grace and blessing and, of course, the competence, again, the competence of the biden administration on the international stage. yeah, i do i want to i don t want to give that any we re going to sneak in a break, no one s going anywhere. when we come back, more on today s news that brittney griner is on her way home. plus, extraordinary verdict in the trump organization tax fraud trial shows that juries are unafraid of showing that donald trump can and will be held accountable. what that might mean for the many, many, many, many other investigations into the twice impeached ex-president. and later in the program, stunning allegations by a former conservative activist that he ra