John Roberts has worked for over twenty years to present himself as the Supreme Court’s moral guide — someone who carefully maintains the Court’s reputation and fairness.
But now, a major investigation has uncovered something different: he may have been protecting his own family’s income from law firms that regularly appear before him.
An independent journalist named Christopher Armitage is now taking legal action against Chief Justice Roberts for this.
The facts are clear.
Roberts’s wife, Jane, earned over $10 million in commissions over seven years by placing senior lawyers at firms that later argued cases before her husband’s court. For sixteen straight years, Roberts falsely listed this income as “salary” on his required federal forms. He also failed to report his wife’s ownership stake in her company for three years, claiming it was due to a mistake. He never stepped aside from any of the more than 500 cases where the law firms that paid his household had a role.
Richard Painter, the former White House ethics lawyer who helped prepare Roberts for his confirmation, said Roberts “fudged the details” by calling his wife’s earnings “salary.”
A legal ethics expert hired by a whistleblower said this was “illegal” as a matter of law.
The law is clear.
Title 5 makes knowingly false disclosures a civil offense — with a penalty of $50,000 per case. Title 18 makes making false statements to the government a felony — with a penalty of up to five years in prison. Title 28 requires judges to step aside if their spouse has a financial interest in a firm that appears before the court. Roberts has apparently broken all three laws repeatedly over two decades.
In response, Roberts created the Court’s first ethics code, but designed it in a way that has no way to enforce rules, no way to file complaints, and no way to punish those who break the rules.
The Brennan Center called it “designed to fail.” He also declined to appear before the Senate Judiciary Committee to explain his actions, citing separation of powers.
Now, Christopher Armitage is filing a complaint to have Roberts disbarred and is asking everyone else to join in.
The DC Bar allows public complaints. You can send them to 515 Fifth Street NW, Building A, Room 117, Washington DC 20001. The relevant rule is DC Rule of Professional Conduct 8.4(c). The relevant laws are 28 U.S.C. § 455, 5 U.S.C. § 13106, and 18 U.S.C. § 1001.
Clarence Thomas took luxury trips.
Samuel Alito traveled privately on company planes. John Roberts took money from law firms through his wife’s paycheck and called it salary for sixteen years.
The system they built is based on the assumption that nobody is paying attention, but Christopher Armitage is paying attention — and so are the rest of us.
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