Trump’s top court pick hit by fresh allegations of abuse
Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the US Supreme Court is at risk of unraveling after new sexual misconduct allegations emerged, just as the Senate Judiciary Committee prepares to hear testimony from a woman claiming he assaulted her in high school.
The New Yorker magazine reported on Sunday that Senate Democrats are investigating an incident that allegedly took place during Kavanaugh’s college years at Yale University, involving a former Yale student. Kavanaugh denied the allegation, and the White House issued a statement saying it stands firmly behind his nomination.
Separately, Michael Avenatti, the lawyer best known for representing adult film star Stephanie Clifford, who says she had an affair with Donald Trump before he was elected president, said on Twitter that he represents a woman “with credible information regarding Judge Kavanaugh”.
Avenatti, who has said he’s considering running for president as a Democrat, said on Twitter his client is not the former Yale student.
Kavanaugh’s nomination was already in a perilous state ahead of a hearing planned for Thursday on an allegation by a California professor, who says he sexually assaulted her at a high school party three decades ago. Kavanaugh, who has denied that claim, is also scheduled to testify. He has denied being at such a party, according to Republican senator Orrin Hatch of Utah, a strong Kavanaugh backer.
Republicans over the weekend stepped up their attempts to discredit the story, and a White House statement on the New Yorker story called the article part of a coordinated attack on the nominee. A second White House statement said the New Yorker hadn’t found any other eyewitnesses to say Kavanaugh was at the party involving the Yale student, and that she acknowledged she had “significant gaps” in her memories of the evening.
The Judiciary panel’s Republican staff “will attempt to evaluate these new claims,” chairman Chuck Grassley’s spokesman, Taylor Foy, said in a statement on Sunday night.
White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said the allegations are “starting to feel like a vast, left-wing conspiracy”.
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