Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson reports $2 million payment for memoir
Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson received a $2 million advance payment for her memoir Lovely One, and her publisher covered travel, lodging and meals for more than a dozen trips the justice took as part of a nationwide tour to promote her book, according to financial disclosures released Tuesday.
The required annual reports, covering activity in 2024, show Justice Sonia Sotomayor was reimbursed by universities for extensive travel to spots including Switzerland, Austria and Hawaii for speaking engagements, question-and answer sessions with law school students and the investiture ceremony of a judge.
Several justices were paid to teach law school courses.
Justice Neil M. Gorsuch received $30,000 from George Mason University to teach in Portugal. Brett M. Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett each received just under $32,000 to teach at Notre Dame Law School, where Barrett was a longtime professor.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. taught a two-week course in Ireland in July, but his compensation from New England Law was not included in the report because he was paid in February, the report shows.
Federal ethics law requires top officials from all branches of government, including the justices, to file annual disclosures listing investments, gifts, outside income and the source of spousal income so the public can assess potential conflicts of interest. Officials from the legislative and executive branch have additional requirements that are more stringent.
The high court announced an ethics policy specific to the nine justices two years ago, following reporting by ProPublica and others that some justices had accepted, but failed to report, extensive free travel and other gifts. The updated policy still lacks an enforcement mechanism, which critics say is essential to ensuring the justices abide by their own rules.
As of January, Roberts was earning an annual salary of $317,500, while associate justices each earn $303,600. The judiciary’s rules limit justices to “outside earned income” of no more than about $33,000.
There are no limits on payments justices receive for writing books, and many have signed lucrative deals with publishers.
Barrett is finishing her book Listening to the Law: Reflections on the Court and Constitution, scheduled for publication in September. An announcement from her publisher, a conservative imprint of Penguin Random House, says Barrett “pulls back the curtain on judicial process, as well as on her path to the court.”
She previously reported a $425,000 payment from the Javelin Group, a literary agency that represents writers in dealings with publishers.
Jackson received an $893,750 advance from Penguin Random House for Lovely One, in addition to the nearly $2.1 million advance reported Tuesday.
Kavanaugh is also at work on legal memoir, for which he has so far received $340,000, according to his 2023 report.
HarperCollins paid Gorsuch more than $250,000 in book royalties last year, his report says. Gorsuch’s most recent book, “Over Ruled,” examines the profusion of laws in the United States and the “human toll so much law can carry for ordinary Americans.”
Last month, Barrett, Jackson, Gorsuch and Sotomayor recused themselves from a decision over whether to hear a case involving the parent company of the book publisher Penguin Random House. The justices did not explain their reasoning for sitting out the discussion, but an ethics expert said it was probably because the case involved the German company Bertelsmann, which owns the publishing house that has published or will be publishing their books.
The case involved a lawsuit by a writer who alleges the best-selling author Ta-Nehisi Coates and others lifted passages from a book he wrote. With the four justices sitting out the decision, there were not enough votes to take the case.
Justice Clarence Thomas did not report any non-investment income, reimbursements or gifts. Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. was granted an extension to file his report, as he has received in past years.
The justices’ activities outside the Supreme Court have been examined and criticized in recent years following news reports that some justices had for years accepted lavish gifts and free travel without proper disclosure and failed to recuse from cases with potential conflicts of interest.
Following those reports, scrutiny from Congress and a clarification in the disclosure rules, Thomas in recent years has begun reporting private jet travel paid for by his friend and benefactor, Texas billionaire Harlan Crow. The justice last year disclosed for the first time Crow’s purchase of three properties from the justice’s family years earlier—transactions that had already been disclosed by ProPublica and which ethics experts had said should have been reported by the justice when they occurred.
Here are summaries from each of the justices’ financial disclosures.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.
In addition to teaching a course on the Supreme Court in Galway, Ireland, last summer, Roberts delivered a lecture at West Point in October. His travel expenses for that were covered by the United States Military Academy.
Justice Clarence Thomas
Thomas did not report any non-investment income, reimbursements or gifts on his financial disclosures.
He disclosed he had failed to report a life insurance policy on previous financial disclosures that dated from 2001.
“The omission was inadvertent and unintentional as filer was not the insured or owner of the policy and confusion arose on whether the policy needed to be disclosed,” Thomas wrote.
Thomas said he terminated the policy in May 2025.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor
Sotomayor received nearly $134,000 in book royalties and advances from her publisher Penguin Random House. She has produced an autobiography and a series of children’s books.
Harvard, New York University, the University of Hawaii and other educational institutions reimbursed Sotomayor for eight trips to give talks, speak to students and attend the investiture of a Minnesota Circuit Court judge.
The destinations included Honolulu, Panama City, Vienna, Zurich and Berkeley. She also received a $1,400 gift to travel to Kansas City, Missouri, to review a musical production of one of her children’s books, Just Ask!
Justice Elena Kagan
Kagan was reimbursed for traveling to New York City to give a speech at the New York University Law School in September for a speech.
Justice Neil M. Gorsuch
Gorsuch received more than $250,000 in book royalties from his publisher Harper Collins. His most recent book, Over Ruled, was released in August.
George Mason University and the National Security Institute paid Gorsuch about $30,000 for a 13-day teaching stint in Porto, Portugal. The Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law in Germany reimbursed him for a two-day trip to Freiberg, Germany, where gave an educational talk and taught.
Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh
Kavanaugh received about $32,000 for teaching at Notre Dame Law School
He disclosed reimbursements for two trips to Notre Dame, Indiana. One was for teaching in October and the second was for judging a moot court competition in November.
Justice Amy Coney Barrett
Barrett’s alma mater, Notre Dame Law School, paid her to teach a seminar in August and covered her travel expenses for a lecture she delivered on campus last January. Pepperdine University in Malibu, California, also paid Barrett’s expenses for a lecture there last fall.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson
Jackson’s publisher Penguin Random House paid for her whirlwind book tour in September, with stops in major cities including San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Miami and Atlanta. The justice’s travel expenses were also covered when she delivered the commencement address last spring at Spelman College in Atlanta.
Write a letter to the editor, share a story tip or update, or report an error.
