Kristi Noem, the nation’s new Secretary of Homeland Security, was running so late for her own swearing-in that Vice President J.D. Vance, who was to administer the oath of office, bailed after waiting 40 minutes.
No problem. The White House merely called on its favorite Supreme Court justice, Clarence Thomas, to administer the oath. Which he did, at his home.
It’s not illegal, experts say, but certainly unusual for one Supreme Court justice to handle so many swearings-in. Traditionally, the vice president has handled those duties but, as CNN’s Dana Bash reports, Thomas is “emerging as the go-to Justice to swear in Donald Trump’s cabinet, overseeing ceremonies at the Supreme Court, at the White House, even at his own home.”
It’s not the violation of tradition that many critics find concerning but rather the closeness between the Supreme Court’s most conservative justice, his wife and the Trump White House.
“You have to understand that Clarence Thomas was the one swearing his loyalty,” said one commenter to the article appearing on Mediaite.
Added another, “They want the DEI Justice Clarence Thomas to swear them in? I thought these Republicans were against DEI?”
Thomas has overseen five swearing-in ceremonies thus far: Attorney General Pam Bondi, Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Scott Turner, Veterans Affairs Administrator Doug Collings, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and Noem.
CNN Supreme Court analyst Joan Biskupic said Trump himself had requested Thomas to conduct the ceremonies. Ginny Thomas, the longest-serving justice’s wife, is one of the president’s most vocal supporters.
“During the first administration, she was regularly in contact with top White House officials,” Biskupic reported. “And then we know in 2020, when Donald Trump lost that election to Joe Biden, she was somebody imploring Mark Meadows, then the chief of staff, to keep fighting, keep fighting, keep fighting.”
“And the January 6 committee found all sorts of emails that she had sent,” she continued. “So that can give you a context of these two especially, you know, Justice Thomas has been, of all the nine justices, the one most willing to sort of interact with the Trump administration.”
Ginny Thomas, a longtime conservative activist, is more than just a Trump fangirl. She was speculated to be one of the six unnamed co-conspirators cited in the federal indictment of Trump by former Special Counsel Jack Smith during his investigation of efforts to overturn the result of the 2020 election.
She is alleged to have sent emails to dozens of Arizona election officials and lawmakers telling them it was their “constitutional duty” to install a “clean slate of electors” willing to declare Trump the winner in that state in 2020.
Thomas has been the focus of scrutiny because of conversations she had with then White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows in the weeks following the 2020 election in which she encouraged him to continue efforts to overturn the results.
Her conversations with Meadows were often dire, imploring the former chief of staff in one message to “help This Great President stand firm Mark!!! … You are the leader, with him, who is standing for America’s constitutional governance at the precipice. The majority knows Biden and the Left is attempting the greatest Heist of our History.”
In another text she urged him to “release the Kraken and save us from the left taking America down.”
Clarence Thomas, meanwhile, was pilloried for allowing himself to be used by Trump. The swearings-in reveal “Thomas doesn’t even bother hiding he’s a bought and paid for justice,” said one commenter.
