An Alaska lawyer, inspired by Donald Trump’s accusers, has leveled a new sex harassment charge against Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, prompting his allies to claim that the judge is the victim of a growing “Democratic smear” machine.
On the heels of the new groping charge reported in the National Law Journal, two key Thomas associates went on the attack, calling the judge, celebrating his 25th year on the Supreme Court, “a good man.”
Mark Paoletta, assistant White House counsel to former President George H.W. Bush, said, “Justice Thomas has hired more than thirty women law clerks over the years, has worked closely with them day in and day out, and none of them has ever accused him of any inappropriate conduct. In fact, they hold him in the highest regard.”
Paoletta, who worked on Thomas’ controversial nomination, added, “I do not consider it a coincidence that this Democratic smear on Justice Thomas comes as he celebrates 25 years on the Court, and in the heat of a presidential election. It is sad and unfortunate when such serious charges are used for political purposes.”
Former Thomas law clerk Carrie Severino said, “The alleged conduct bears no resemblance to the man I worked closely with, with whom I still count as a friend after nearly 10 years.”
According to the Law Journal story, Moira Smith said that the stories from women about Trump prompted her to go on Facebook to claim that Thomas groped her at a dinner party in June 1999. “He groped me while I was setting the table, suggesting I should sit ‘right next to him,'” wrote, Smith, a vice president and general counsel to Enstar Natural Gas Co., in Alaska
At the time she was 23 and helping her boss with the small Truman Foundation dinner party in Falls Church, Va.
Eight years earlier Thomas was under attack at his court confirmation hearings from one-time aide Anita Hill who leveled her own harassment claims. Thomas denied the allegations and responded that he was the subject of a Democratic-launched “high-tech lynching.”
He also denied those made by Smith.
The Law Journal found two former house mates of Smith who said they recalled her story.
As with many of Trump’s accusers Smith, her former house mates and her husband have deep Democratic ties, links pointed out by Severino in a post on National Review.
Smith is a registered Democrat married to the former Alaska Democratic Party chair who was forced to withdraw from a 2008 congressional race after it was revealed that his campaign was responsible for creating fake web sites targeting a rival.
Her former husband worked for President Obama and one of her former housemates, Laura Fink, that backed up her story did work for Hillary Rodham Clinton and posed for a photo with Bill Clinton.
Paoletta suggested that Smith was motivated by politics.
“Justice Thomas has served honorably on the Supreme Court for 25 years, and conservative and liberal scholars alike have praised his remarkable record of jurisprudence. He is the longest serving black justice in our nation’s history, but unfortunately he has been constantly attacked because he challenges the liberal orthodoxy. This is the latest in those attacks from a person who, as the Law.com story makes clear, is a Democratic partisan, having contributed to Democratic candidates and worked as a staffer for a Democratic elected official. Her husband, the former head of the Alaska Democratic Party, had to withdraw in disgrace from a congressional race after it was revealed that his campaign resorted to dirty tricks by setting up a fake website to smear his political opponent in the Democratic primary,” he said in a statement to Secrets.
Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner’s “Washington Secrets” columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]
