Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s son quietly landed a political appointee job as a lawyer in the Treasury Department early last year, NOTUS has learned, posing a potential conflict of interest as courts wrestle with challenges to President Donald Trump’s deal to avoid future tax audits and the new massive $1.776 billion fund meant to enrich his allies.
Philip Alito has been working as an attorney with the Treasury’s office of the general counsel, which provides legal and policy advice to Secretary Scott Bessent, according to four former government officials who confirmed he worked there. NOTUS was also able to obtain a functional email address at the department for Alito.
Alito’s employment with the department is something of a closely guarded secret. He doesn’t maintain a public resume or LinkedIn, the Treasury Department website makes no mention of him, and his three professional bar listings are outdated or incorrectly list previous employers.
Alito was hired to the Treasury general counsel’s “front office” in the first months of the second Trump administration as the White House sought to staff loyal political appointees across the federal government, according to one former official with direct knowledge of the arrangement. His exact role was still being sorted during his first few weeks there as senior officials rearranged professional responsibilities, this official added.
“Everybody knew who he was. I think it’s fair to say he kept a pretty low profile. I kind of had the impression that he was kind of a little bit sheepish about his celebrity affiliation. You’d go into a meeting and if people were introducing themselves by first and last name, he’d just say ‘Phil,’ not Phil Alito. He’s a pretty soft-spoken guy,” this person said.
Alito was made an attorney-adviser who would get briefed on all kinds of important Treasury matters and offer legal feedback, according to a second source.
“There’s no doubt he got that position because of who he is,” the second person said. “[Advisers] are in all the meetings, so they knew all the issues across the board.”
The younger Alito was an attorney at the Treasury when alawsuitagainst the department and several other agencies was argued before the Supreme Court in November challenging Trump’suse of emergency powersto issue tariffs. The department never disclosed that in court documents. His father, Justice Alito, did not recuse himself from the case — and ultimately joined in adissentwritten by Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The majority ruled in February that Trump didn’t have the authority to issue sweeping tariffs, and the decision set into motion the massive refunds that now beguile the Trump administration.
Potential conflicts of interest abound going forward. There are already federal legal challenges to Trump’s so-called “Anti-Weaponization Fund” that calls on the Treasury Department to provide access to $1.776 billion in public money to reward people who claim to have been targeted unfairly by the Justice Department. The administration is expected to use some of those funds to reward the Jan. 6 insurrectionists Trump pardoned on his first day back in office.
That case could ultimately drag the Treasury Department before the Supreme Court, with aVirginia lawsuitfrom the advocacy group Democracy Forward saying the fund is “on a collision course with the United States Constitution” and aD.C. lawsuitfiled by two former Capitol Police officers calling it “a corrupt sham.”
Source: Drudge Report
