Crystal Clanton Lands On Her Feet
The controversial conservative clerk has a new job—with a controversial conservative employer.
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Back in September, after the assassination of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk, a reader asked me whether I knew what Crystal Clanton was up to nowadays. Clanton worked for Kirk at his nonprofit, Turning Point USA, and rose through the ranks to become his “top lieutenant,” according to The New York Times.
In 2017, The New Yorker reported that while she was at TPUSA, Clanton allegedly sent text messages to a colleague that said, among other things, “I HATE BLACK PEOPLE. Like f**k them all…. I hate blacks. End of story.” There’s a long, complicated backstory here; I won’t rehash it here, but if you’re not familiar with it, please read An Open Letter To Crystal Clanton and A Counterpoint On Crystal Clanton—From A Leading Libel Lawyer.
After her time at TPUSA, Clanton entered the legal field. She graduated from Scalia Law School, in 2022; clerked for two federal judges, Judge Corey Maze (N.D. Ala.) and Chief Judge William “Bill” Pryor (11th Cir.); and clerked for Justice Clarence Thomas, during October Term 2024 (the 2024-2025 judicial year). Clanton’s clerkship with Justice Thomas concluded in July 2025, so asking about her whereabouts in September 2025 would be understandable.
It’s not uncommon, however, for Supreme Court clerks to take time off after their clerkships are done and before starting their new jobs. Who wouldn’t want to take the six-figure signing bonus offered by Biglaw firms to ex-SCOUTS clerks and go on a lengthy, luxury vacation?1
But now it’s late January, so most clerks from OT 2024 know where they’re going next (if they’re not there already). Where in the world is Crystal Clanton?
As it turns out, the answer has been a matter of public record for quite some time. But until now, it hasn’t been reported by any news outlet.2
Crystal Clanton is currently an attorney at the America First Legal Foundation, the conservative nonprofit law firm that Gene Hamilton and Stephen Miller co-founded in 2021, shortly after the end of the first Trump administration. Hamilton is back at AFL, after six months in the White House, and leads AFL as its president; Miller is back in the White House and remains there, where he serves as deputy chief of staff for policy—and, in the words of The Atlantic (gift link), “turns President Trump’s most incendiary impulses into policy.”3 [UPDATE (1/28/2026, 10:03 a.m.): Corrected to note that Hamilton went to the White House at the start of the second Trump administration for a few months, before returning to AFL.]
How do we know that Clanton is now at AFL? From court records.
One case being litigated by AFL is University of South Florida College Republicans v. Lutnick (M.D. Fla.), which AFL describes as “a landmark lawsuit, alleging that the 2020 Census was unconstitutional and violated federal law.” On October 7, 2025, the plaintiffs filed a pro hac vice motion for Clanton, to allow her to represent the plaintiffs despite not being admitted to the court where the case is pending (the Middle District of Florida). On October 8, the motion was granted.
According to the motion, Clanton “is an attorney with the law firm America First Legal” and “an active member in good standing of the Bar of the State of Alabama.” A quick search for Clanton on the Alabama State Bar website confirms her membership. (She was admitted in 2022, five years after The New Yorker reported on her alleged texts, so they apparently didn’t create a character-and-fitness problem for her.)
Clanton works on other cases for AFL as well. On January 12, she filed a pro hac vice motion (granted that same day) in S.W. v. Loudoun County School Board. As noted on AFL’s website, its clients in S.W. are “[t]wo boys from Stone Bridge High School in Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS), [who] were issued a 10-day suspension and deemed guilty of Title IX ‘sexual harassment’ for complaining about a girl in their locker room” (or, if you prefer, for complaining about a transgender student or a student assigned female at birth in their locker room).
It makes perfect sense that Clanton now works for America First Legal. As a staunch conservative, she surely supports AFL’s agenda. As for AFL, it’s an aggressive, fairly in-your-face organization—one that delights in triggering or trolling the left. So any controversy over Clanton’s alleged texts might be, from AFL’s perspective, a feature and not a bug—a reason to hire Clanton, not to shun her.
By hiring Clanton, AFL is sending a message: “The establishment tried to cancel Crystal Clanton—but we welcomed her, with open arms.” Or put another way, “Give us your tired, your poor, your conservative-but-nearly-canceled masses, yearning to breathe free.”
Here’s what I wonder: did Clanton apply to any other employers, including law firms, and was AFL a fallback option? Or was going to a place like AFL her first choice?4
I wouldn’t be surprised if Clanton went straight to AFL, not bothering to apply to any firms. As a litigator for conservative causes, she can have a much greater impact on law and public policy than an anonymous associate toiling away at a firm. And based on her pre-law-school work in politics—at TPUSA and later at Liberty Consulting, Ginni Thomas’s firm—Clanton wants to have an impact.
I could see her eventually becoming her generation’s Kristen Waggoner, CEO of the Alliance Defending Freedom (and, based on her track record of winning hot-button cases over divisive social issues, the Queen of Right-Wing Impact Litigation). Clanton could end up having a controversial but consequential career—not unlike her former boss, Justice Clarence Thomas.
Like it or not, the world hasn’t heard the last of Crystal Carolyn Clanton.
What’s the going rate for SCOTUS clerk bonuses? If you have solid information, please email me at davidlat@substack.com or text me at 917-397-2751 (texts only—no calls).
The last reliable report I’m aware of, from January 2024, had them at $500,000. A commenter on a Reddit thread reports that Jones Day pays $700,000 signing bonuses to SCOTUS clerks. I can’t confirm or deny this, but I do know that Jones Day pays above-market rates for SCOTUS clerk talent—which explains why it attracts the most SCOTUS clerks, year after year. But I’m not sure it’s all through the signing bonus.
Jones Day takes a unique approach to associate compensation. Beyond the first year, it doesn’t employ a lockstep pay system, in which all associates in the same class year earn the same base salary. Instead, compensation is individualized and also “black box”—i.e., associates at Jones Day don’t know how much their peers are making.
Jones Day uses its black-box compensation system to pay SCOTUS clerks well above the market by giving them sky-high base salaries. If another firm did this, it might engender resentment among the non-SCOTUS clerks (beyond the resentment already generated by $500,000 signing bonuses). But Jones Day can get away with paying inflated base salaries to SCOTUS clerks because, under its system, the non-SCOTUS clerks have no idea what their SCOTUS-clerk peers are getting in terms of base salary.
Word on the street is thanks to giant signing bonuses and above-market base pay, some ex-SCOTUS clerks at Jones Day were breaking $1 million in total first-year comp as of a few years ago. So who knows what SCOTUS clerks are earning at Jones Day today?
If the answer to “who knows” is “you,” please email me at davidlat@substack.com or text me at 917-397-2751. I’d also welcome your help if know the identities of the next class of clerks for Justices Sotomayor and Jackson, who finished their hiring last weekend and last month, respectively. Once I have these clerks’ names, I’ll issue a new SCOTUS clerk hiring roundup. As usual, my default is anonymity for my sources. Thanks!
As a result of this lack of reporting, if you ask ChatGPT or Perplexity where Crystal Clanton is currently working, they’ll tell you she’s clerking for Chief Judge Pryor (ChatGPT) or Justice Thomas (Perplexity). So these LLMs are not (yet) “smart” enough to do the (pretty basic) research that I did, using court records to ascertain an attorney’s employment. I guess I still have a job—for now.
If you find The Atlantic’s description of Miller’s influence too loaded, Bloomberg similarly reports that Miller “excels at channeling the president’s desires.” The key point, which Miller’s defenders and detractors can agree upon, is that he’s one of Trump’s most powerful advisers—privately referred to by some as “the prime minister,” per Bloomberg.
Given her controversial past, would Clanton have had a hard time getting a job at a law firm? A Biglaw firm—even Jones Day, possibly—might have balked. But I could see a right-of-center boutique being open to hiring her. And Libby Locke of Clare Locke, the high-powered defamation firm with many conservative clients, previously extended Clanton a job offer in these pages (after disagreeing with my own career advice to Clanton).
What about compensation? I’m guessing that AFL didn’t give Clanton a $500,000 signing bonus. But as you can see from its tax filings, AFL is financially strong, with revenue that’s more than double its expenses, and it pays its people well—with Gene Hamilton receiving total compensation of almost $800,000 in 2024, and at least six other employees earning more than $200,000. So I wouldn’t be shocked if AFL tried to do something nice for Clanton on the financial front, at least on a one-time basis, to recognize what she could have earned at a firm—and I’ll definitely be looking for her name when AFL’s next Form 990 becomes public.
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She also lived with Justice Thomas right?