The Lever – “If billionaires’ largesse was designed to keep the justice on the high court, experts say the money could be considered a taxable payment… Much of the public outcry over Thomas’ long history of undisclosed gifts has centered on whether the activities violate federal ethics laws. Lawmakers have also zeroed in on one particular donation — a $267,000 loan Thomas used to purchase a RV — arguing that if part of that loan was forgiven, Thomas would have to pay taxes on that amount. Thomas has denied that the gifts were granted in exchange for favorable court rulings. Explaining that some of these donors were “among [his] dearest friends,” he declared in an  April 7 statement via the Supreme Court’s public information office that the cushy trips they bankrolled were just vacations: “As friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips during the more than quarter century we have known them.” But if these billionaires’ largesse were designed to retain the conservative judge on the country’s highest court, the donations might fall outside of the definition of tax-free gifts, which according to the Supreme Court must stem from “detached and disinterested generosity.” If the benefits showered on Thomas were designed to elicit court actions or job decisions, they could be considered taxable income, whether or not there is definitive proof of quid pro quo on Thomas’ part.

What Clarence Thomas has done would result in not only any judges in America being removed from the bench, but there is a good chance it would result in criminal prosecution for income tax fraud and for false filings in his mandatory financial ethics disclosure statements,” David Cay Johnston, a visiting lecturer at Syracuse University’s College of Law, told The Lever. Taxation of unreported income recently emerged as a political flashpoint and focus of federal prosecutors: In January, President Donald Trump’s longtime financial chief was sentenced to five months at the Rikers Island jail complex for failing to report or pay taxes on $1.7 million in off-the-books compensation…”