Samuel Alito blames wife again as he rejects calls to step aside over upside down flag flap

Conservative Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito will not recuse himself from upcoming cases involving January 6 rioters or Donald Trump despite recent controversies over two controversial, political flags flown at his homes.

In a letter, dated Wednesday and addressed to more than 30 members of Congress, Justice Alito wrote that he will not recuse himself from case,Trump v US — which will determine if the former president has criminal immunity — or Fischer v US examining if January 6 rioters were correctly charged with a specific crime.

Earlier this month, the New York Times revealed that an upside-down American flag was flown at Justice Alito’s Virginia home following the 2020 presidential election — a symbol used by the “stop the steal” movement supporting Mr Trump’s false claims of election fraud.

It was subsequently revealed that an “Appeal to Heaven” flag was flown at Alito’s New Jersey vacation home, a symbol carried by rioters on January 6.

In Wednesday’s letter, Justice Alito once again blamed his wife,Martha-Ann Alito, for the incident as he had done in the immediate aftermath of the controversies.

“My wife is fond of flying flags. I am not,” Justice Alito wrote. “She was solely responsible for having flagpoles put up at our residence and our vacation home and has flown a wide variety of flags over the years.”

Citing the non-binding Supreme Court code of ethics, Justice Alito argued in the letter that he was not required to disqualify himself because “this event does not meet the applicable standard for recusal.”

Justice Alito assured those he had “nothing to do whatsoever” with the flags, and was unaware the upside-down American flag was being flown. He wrote that when he asked his wife to take it down, she