- Justice Clarence Thomas' wife, Ginni, had ties to organizers of a January 6, 2021 rally, per The New York Times.
- The Times also reported on Ginni Thomas' connections with people who sought to overturn the 2020 election results.
- Thomas served on the board of a conservative group that pushed for its members to challenge the election results.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' wife, Ginni Thomas, had ties to organizers of a January 6, 2021 rally in support of President Donald Trump as well as to efforts to subvert the 2020 election results, according to a New York Times Magazine report published on Tuesday.
The Times revealed details about Thomas' role, which had been previously unreported. The Washington Post reported last month that Thomas shared a Facebook post on January 6 before the violence broke out. "LOVE MAGA people!!!! GOD BLESS EACH OF YOU STANDING UP or PRAYING!" she wrote.
Thomas, a longtime conservative activist, played a peacemaking role between rally organizers "so that there wouldn't be any division around January 6," Dustin Stockton, who helped organized the Ellipse rally, told The Times. The Ellipse rally took place shortly before a crowd of Trump supporters descended on the Capitol, clashed with law enforcement officials, and interrupted the 2020 election certification.
"The way it was presented to me was that Ginni was uniting these different factions around a singular mission on January 6," Stockton said. The Times noted that other rally organizers disputed Stockton's account about Thomas but did not offer specifics.
Thomas also served on the advisory board of Turning Point USA, a conservative nonprofit that sponsored the event and provided buses for rallygoers on January 6, 2021, The Times reported.
Thomas is also connected to people who sought to undo the 2020 election results. John Eastman, the lawyer who wrote a memo — without any evidence — on how then-Vice President Mike Pence could overturn the election results, previously clerked for Clarence Thomas at the Supreme Court, and is a close friend to the couple, per The Times.
Steve Bannon, a one-time White House chief strategist for Trump, also endorsed efforts to challenge the election results. Ginni Thomas founded a group called Groundswell with Bannon's support, per The Times.
Thomas also served on the board of the Council for National Policy's political arm, CNP Action, which circulated a document titled "Election Results and Legal Battles: What Now?" after the presidential election, according to The Times. The document urged members to call on Republican state lawmakers to challenge the 2020 election results.
In December 2020, CNP Action shared a newsletter with a report called "Five States and the Election Irregularities and Issues," featuring five swing states where Trump had been attempting to overturn the results. The newsletter pointed to "historical, legal precedent for Congress to count a slate of electors different from that certified by the Governor of the state," according to The Times.