The faded calendar which prompted teenage memories
Kavanaugh’s scrawl recalls friends at party at centre of claims, write Michael Kranish, Joe Heim and Emma Brown
IT was one of the last questions Rachel Mitchell, the outside counsel for the Senate Republicans, posed to Brett Kavanaugh last Thursday: What did his notations on the July 1 entry of his faded 1982 calendar mean?
On it, the then-17-year-old had scrawled: “Go to Timmy’s for skis with Judge, Tom, PJ, Bernie and Squi.”
Kavanaugh offered few additional details during Thursday’s contentious hearing. “It looks like we went over to Timmy’s,” he said, saying he regularly documented such “small get-togethers”.
What occurred on that summer evening 36 years ago is now emerging as one of the key questions facing the FBI as it reopens its background investigation into the US Supreme Court nominee.
Democrats have seized on Kavanaugh’s notes as possible evidence that supports Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation that she was sexually assaulted by him at a teenage gathering that summer, a charge he vehemently denies.
“This may — may — be powerful corroborating evidence that the assault happened,” Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, said last Friday. “That it happened that day. And that it happened in that place.”
Kavanaugh’s calendar makes no reference to her, and he said last Thursday that he does not recall Ford. She attended the private girls school Holton-Arms, he noted, stressing that he socialised largely with girls who attended Catholic schools.
“She and I did not travel in the same social circles,” he told the Senate Judiciary Committee. “It is possible that we met at some point at some events, although I do not recall that.”
However, Kavanaugh’s July 1 entry shows a nexus between their social worlds — and the presence of two of the people Ford said were in attendance at the gathering where she was attacked.
According to Kavanaugh’s testimony, “Timmy” on his calendar entry refers to Tim Gaudette, a Georgetown Prep classmate. Two other friends who he named as being in attendance on July 1 were Mark Judge and Patrick “PJ” Smyth.
When she first contacted The Washington Post in early July, Ford identified Judge and Smyth as two teenage boys who were present the evening she was assaulted.
Kavanaugh’s calendar was not released publicly until last week.
Ford also testified that she had “socialised” around that time with another boy who Kavanaugh said was present at the July 1 gathering, Chris Garrett, referred to on the calendar as “Squi”.
Garrett did not respond to requests for comment.
Tom Kane, a 1983 graduate of Georgetown Prep who was close friends with Kavanaugh, said in an interview last Tuesday that he knew Ford, who, he said, was dating Garrett at the time.
Kane said Ford was not close with their group and remembered her only as “very young-looking”.
He added that he did not know whether Kavanaugh knew Ford, and he rejected the idea that Kavanaugh assaulted her.
“The whole allegation is absurd, and Brett would never do anything like that,” Kane said.
“If it had happened, I would know about it. We all would have known about it.”
Kavanaugh testified that a “Tom Kane” was among those in attendance July 1.
Kane declined to comment last Friday on whether he attended the July 1 gathering. “I am sure the FBI will give it clarity,” he wrote in a text.
The other friend Kavanaugh named as being in attendance at the July 1 event was Bernie McCarthy, another Georgetown Prep alumnus who was his teammate on the basketball team. He did not respond to requests for comment.
Ford acknowledged in her testimony that her memory is fuzzy on some of the details of the day.
She said that after swimming at the Columbia Country Club in Bethesda, Maryland, she went to a gathering at a house about 15 minutes away.
That summer, Gaudette’s mother owned a two-story home in Rockville, Maryland, less than 11 miles from the Columbia Country Club, according to property records.
The house sits across the street from a park with tennis courts and is a short distance from Interstate 270, a major artery leading to the nation’s capital. There was no answer at the brick home last Friday.
Gaudette did not respond to a request for comment.
Ford testified that at least four boys and one girl were at the gathering. She said Kavanaugh and Judge were drunk and that someone pushed her into a second-floor bedroom, where Kavanaugh allegedly pinned her down on the bed and tried to yank off her clothing before she escaped to a bathroom.
She said three other people were downstairs: Smyth, her friend Leland Keyser, and a boy whose name she cannot recall.
Kavanaugh, in his testimony, dismissed Ford’s recollection of the event by saying her version “is refuted by the people allegedly there”.
Judge, who agreed to cooperate with an FBI investigation, wrote in a letter to the Judiciary Committee that “I do not recall the events described by Dr Ford,” adding: “I never saw Brett act in the manner Dr Ford describes.”
Keyser has previously told The Washington Post that while she did not recall the party, she was close friends with Ford and she believes Ford is telling the truth.
Keyser’s attorney, Howard Walsh, wrote to the Senate Judiciary Committee on September 22, stating: “Ms Keyser does not know Mr Kavanaugh and she has no recollection of ever being at a party or gathering where he was present, with, or without, Dr Ford.”
He did not respond last Friday to a request for comment.
Smyth has also denied any knowledge of the party in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee sent by his attorney, Eric Bruce. He signed a letter of support for Kavanaugh and called him “a person of great integrity”.
Smyth “is happy to cooperate” with an FBI investigation, Bruce said in a statement.
In his testimony, Kavanaugh said the evening Ford described “presumably happened on a weekend because I believe everyone worked and had jobs in the summers. And, in any event, a drunken early evening event of the kind she describes, presumably it happened on a weekend.” July 1 was a Thursday. Democrat Senator Cory Booker pressed Kavanaugh on whether the reference to “skis” on his calendar referred to “brewskis”, which the nominee did not dispute. Booker also asked him whether he drank on weekdays.
“I’d say that’s rare,” Kavanaugh responded. “Are you talking about during the school year?”
“I’m talking about the calendars that you provided during these dates,” Booker replied.
“Oh, that’s in the — in the summer after a football workout,” Kavanaugh said, adding, “In the summer when we went over to Timmy’s house on July 1, that would indicate, yes.”
‘Go to Timmy’s for skis with Judge, Tom, PJ, Bernie and Squi’