Related: Read Garland’s financial reports filed in 2013, 2014 and 2015
His reimbursed travel from 2012 to 2014 was limited to one or two trips annually to Harvard Law School, his alma mater, and Yale Law School. He participated in moot courts and career forums.
Garland reported no gifts, no financial agreements and no financial liabilities. He serves on the board of directors of the Historical Society of the D.C. Circuit, but he holds no other positions with nonprofits, private companies or other organizations.
Garland’s financial holdings include a mix of bank accounts, trusts, brokerage accounts and IRAs. Judges don’t report the precise value of their accounts, stocks and other assets, but instead list a range. They must report their own investments as well as those of a spouse and any dependent children, and the reports don’t specify which holdings are joint or individual.
Using the lowest possible value of the dollar amount ranges provided, Garland reported bank and credit union accounts valued at more than $465,000.
He reported a brokerage account that includes stock in General Mills, Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, General Electric, Procter & Gamble, J.M. Smucker and Citigroup. His stocks, bonds, IRAs and other investments yielded dividends and interest of at least $165,500. The judge also reported at least $100,000 in rent income through New York property held in a trust. A search of New York property records didn’t show property under Garland’s name.
Judges and other high-level officials in the executive and legislative branches are required by the federal Ethics in Government Act—adopted in the aftermath of the Watergate scandal—to file annual financial reports. The reports are due in the middle of May. Garland’s last three reports were filed on time.
The financial reporting process recently came under scrutiny after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February. Scalia died at a ranch in Marfa, Texas, that belonged to Texas businessman John Poindexter. Rooms at the ranch are normally rented out, but Scalia was among a group reportedly staying there as Poindexter’s guests.
A subsidiary of a company that Poindexter owned was involved in litigation that reached the Supreme Court the previous year. A free room would normally qualify as a gift that must be reported, but Scalia’s stay at Poindexter’s ranch likely would not have appeared on his next financial report because there is an exception for hospitality at a private home or other property that the host owns.
