Sotomayor Didn’t Recuse Self from Penguin Book Cases, Despite Having Received $3M

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor reportedly declined to recuse herself from multiple copyright infringement cases involving Penguin Random House, despite having been paid millions by the publisher for her books.

The reported recusals are based on The Daily Wire’s review of documents, in a story that states the income from the publisher is, was or continues to be the liberal justice’s largest source of income.

In 2010, Sotomayor got a $1.2 million book advance from the publisher’s Knopf Doubleday Group imprint. In 2012, she reported receiving two advance payments from the publisher totaling $1.9 million, The Daily Wire also reports.

In 2013, Sotomayor voted in a decision regarding whether the high court should hear a case against the publisher – Aaron Greenspan v. Random House.

She voted despite then-fellow Justice Stephen Breyer having recusing himself because he also received money from the publisher.

Greenspan was classmates at Harvard with Mark Zuckerberg and who wrote a book about Zuckerberg’s founding of Facebook. He contended Random House rejected his book proposal, then awarded a deal to another author who copied his book and eventually turned it into the movie “The Social Network.”

In another example, one of about five cited by The Daily Wire, Sotomayor, in 2017, began receiving payments each year from Penguin Random House that continued annually through at least 2021, the most recent disclosure available. The total was over $500,000.

In all, she received $3.6 million from Penguin Random House or its subsidiaries, according to a Daily Wire tally of the financial disclosures.

Sotomayor, who joined the court in 2009, is a prolific author. Her works include the memoir “My Beloved World” and children’s books such as “Turning Pages: My Life Story” and “A Judge Grows In the Bronx.”