Supreme Court Needs Congress to Help on AI, Clarence Thomas Says

The US Supreme Court isn’t suited to handle issues involving artificial intelligence without better clarity from lawmakers, Justice Clarence Thomas warned.

“We’re going to have some challenges with AI,” Thomas said on Wednesday at the University of Texas at Austin. “I don’t even know what that is.”

“There are some things that should have been addressed with legislation,” Thomas added, coupling AI with issues on defamation and intellectual property that he says haven’t been addressed through lawmaking.

Thomas’ comments came a week after Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned law students at the University of Alabama School of Law that blind adoption of AI could lead to unfortunate results.

“It has the potential to perpetuate the very best in us and the very worst in us,” Sotomayor said. “Because what goes into computers, if it’s bad data, what comes out is bad results.”

Thomas briefly touched on AI in response to a submitted question on originalism and whether his commitment to the Constitution as written limits his ability to address issues of technology like AI that haven’t arisen until now. It doesn’t, he said.

“I think we have shown a capacity to do it and it may not be able to address them all, but I think we’re in a good position to do that,” he said. “But I also think that there’s some things that can be addressed statutorily to that.”

Thomas visited UT-Austin as part of a celebration of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.

Following an hour-long prepared speech, he answered questions submitted by students and asked by William Inboden, executive vice president and provost. He criticized legal pundits who slam the court’s opinions based on their political views, not the law, and compared them to football fans who bash an official who made a call that cost their team a win.

“When they like an outcome, you’re great. When they don’t like an outcome, you’re horrible, you’re political,” he said. “I don’t think that’s good for our country.”

He lamented a breakdown in civility on college campuses that he said will impact the judiciary “because these are the young people who will be in these jobs.”

Those in attendance included Judge James Ho of the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Ho, who clerked for Thomas, is viewed as a potential Supreme Court nominee should a vacancy arise and President Donald Trump gets to fill it.

Thomas, 77, is the most senior member of the court, having served since 1991. He didn’t discuss retirement on Wednesday. Retirement speculation has focused more recently on Justice Samuel Alito, 76.

Others in the 1,000 seat Hogg Memorial Auditorium included Fifth Circuit Judges Don Willett and Andrew Oldham, Chief Justice Jimmy Blacklock of the Texas Supreme Court, and Robert Chesney, dean of UT School of Law.

Early in his speech, Thomas shouted out Harlan Crow, a Texas billionaire who Thomas said was in the audience. Thomas previously came under scrutiny over revelations that Crow paid for private jet flights and luxury vacations that Thomas failed to disclose.