A simmering dispute between branches of government over Supreme Court ethics reform boiled over Friday when Justice Samuel Alito publicly rejected a senator’s call to recuse himself from an upcoming case due to a perceived conflict of interest. After Alito was interviewed for a report in the opinion pages of The Wall Street Journal and expressed the view that Congress has no authority over the high court, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois in August urged Chief Justice John Roberts to take steps to ensure that the prominent conservative justice recuse himself from cases concerning legislation that regulates the high court. He also asked for Alito’s recusal in the case of Moore v. United States – a major tax case in which the petitioners are represented in part by one of the authors of the report in the Journal. Durbin, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has been among lawmakers leading a push for ethics reform at the high court that has come to a head amid bombshell reports in recent months questioning the ethics of some justices. He argued along with committee Democrats that, in this situation, the writer’s “access to Justice Alito and efforts to help Justice Alito air his personal grievances could cast doubt on Justice Alito’s ability to fairly discharge his duties” in the tax case.

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Persons: Samuel Alito, Alito, Democratic Sen, Dick Durbin of, John Roberts, Alito’s, Moore, Durbin, ”, Durbin’s, ” Alito, “ Organizations: Street, Democratic, Dick Durbin of Illinois, United, Committee, Senate Locations: United States