Judges 'livid' with Clarence Thomas over secret yacht trips: 'Why respect for the Court has plummeted'

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas issued a rare public statement in response to a bombshell ProPublica story this week that he accepted millions of dollars in luxury travel from a Republican megadonor without reporting it.

"Early in my tenure at the court, I sought guidance from my colleagues and others in the judiciary and was advised that this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends who do not have business before the court was not reportable," said Thomas. "I have endeavored to follow that counsel throughout my tenure and have always sought to comply with the disclosure guidelines."

Despite his defense of his actions, said CNN's Ariane de Vogue on "The Lead" Friday, many federal judges don't feel the same way.

"You've gotten some reaction from federal judges to the report," said anchor Jake Tapper. "What did they tell you?"

"They don't usually speak up, even though they didn't use their names, but I talked to one group," said de Vogue. "Really, they were livid about this, they said. One of the judges said, 'This is precisely why the public respect for the Supreme Court has plummeted. This is far greater than mere ethics violations. It's about the perceived legitimacy of the Supreme Court.'"

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"I did talk to other judges who actually sided with them," de Vogue added. "They're like, these rules then were vague and he was following the rules. And I pressed and I said, yeah, but here we're talking about luxury trips, right, private jets, yachts, not like the fancy car on Uber or something, really important ones. And he said, look they were the rules, he followed the rules. But it's opened up a firestorm, and maybe now a lot of judges are wondering, with this fresh look at at their ethics disclosures, if that's going to start a whole new story. The Court still does not have an official code of conduct, though, right and that is really that's the next big story."

"Justice Earl Warren, 54 years ago, wanted them to do it after the whole Abe Fortas debacle," noted Tapper.

Watch video below or at this link.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kI6laQFY93E&feature=youtu.be expand=1 site_id=20266338] Ariane de Vogue reports judges reaction to Clarence Thomas gift storywww.youtube.com