GOP Reps Introduce Bill Making Supreme Court Leaks A Federal Crime

A group of Republican members of Congress introduced a bill Tuesday that would make it a federal crime to leak confidential information, including draft opinions, from the Supreme Court.

Louisiana Representative Mike Johnson (R) introduced the “Leaker Accountability Act” Tuesday, in response to the leaking of a draft Supreme Court opinion in the case of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization. If enacted, the bill would make it a federal crime to obstruct Supreme Court deliberations by knowingly divulging confidential information. Eleven of Johnson’s Republican colleagues co-signed the bill.

“The unauthorized leak of the draft opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health constitutes a grave breach of judicial ethics and a deliberate attack on the independence of the Supreme Court,” Johnson said in a press release Tuesday. “This legislation is now, unfortunately, a necessary step to discourage future such attempts to intimidate justices during their deliberative process and restore independence to the Court so that it can ensure the American people are afforded equal and impartial justice under the law. The institution of the Court has been damaged and we must do what we can to try to repair it.”

The text of the legislation states in part:

Whoever, while serving as an officer or employee of the Supreme Court, violates this section by knowingly publishing, divulging, disclosing, or making known in any manner or to any extent not authorized by law any confidential information coming to that officer or employee in the course of the employment or official duties of that officer or employee shall be imprisoned not more than 5 years or fined under this title, or both.

The bill defines “confidential information” to include: internal notes on cases heard by the Court; internal communications between a Justice of the Supreme Court and an employee or officer on a matter presently before the Court; or between one employee or officer and another; a draft opinion; a final opinion before the date it is scheduled to be released to the public; personal information about a Justice that is not otherwise legally available to the public; or any other information deemed confidential at the discretion of the Chief Justice.

The bill was co-sponsored by New York Rep. and GOP House Conference Chair Elise Stefanik (R), West Virginia Rep. David McKinley (R), Illinois Rep. Mary Miller (R), Oklahoma Rep. Markwayne Mullin (R), Wisconsin Reps. Tom Tiffany (R) and Scott Fitzgerald (R), Utah Rep. Burgess Owens (R), North Carolina Rep. Dan Bishop (R), Indiana Rep. Victoria Spartz (R), Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert (R), and Virginia Rep. Bob Good (R).

Johnson’s legislation comes after the Court’s initial draft of the majority opinion was leaked in the Dobbs v. Jackson case earlier this month. Politico obtained a draft of the opinion, authored by Justice Samuel Alito, in which the Court reportedly not only upheld a Mississippi abortion law but struck down Roe v. Wade and returned the issue of abortion to the jurisdiction of individual states.

The leaked draft sparked widespread protests from abortion activists. It also prompted top Republicans to call for the Court to begin an internal investigation into the leak. Former Attorney General William Barr called the leak a “crime,” and suggested in several interviews that the leaker could be prosecuted for obstruction of justice.