Kavanaugh hits back at testimony
WASHINGTON: Fighting to salvage his US Supreme Court nomination, Brett Kavanaugh has angrily denied a university professor’s accusation that he sexually assaulted her 36 years ago in a day of dramatic testimony that gripped the country.
Christine Blasey Ford, her voice sometimes cracking with emotion, appeared in public for the first time to detail her allegation against Kavanaugh, a conservative federal appeals court judge chosen by President Donald Trump for a lifetime job on the top US court.
Ford told the senate judiciary committee she feared Kavanaugh would rape and accidentally kill her during the alleged assault in 1982, when both were high school students in Maryland.
She said she was ‘‘100% certain’’ it was Kavanaugh who assaulted her.
Kavanaugh testified after Ford finished her appearance, claiming he was the victim of ‘‘grotesque and obvious character assassination’’ orchestrated by Senate Democrats. He said he ‘‘unequivocally and categorically’’ denied Ford’s allegation and vowed he would not back down.
‘‘I will not be intimidated into withdrawing from this process,’’ he added.
Although they were at no point in the hearing room together, the clash pitted his word against hers.
Writing on Twitter after the hearing, Trump said of Kavanaugh: ‘‘His testimony was powerful, honest, and riveting. Democrats’ search and destroy strategy is disgraceful and this process has been a total sham and effort to delay, obstruct, and resist. The Senate must vote!’’
Kavanaugh sharply attacked Democratic senators, calling himself the victim of ‘‘a calculated and orchestrated political hit’’ fuelled by anger on the left at Trump’s 2016 election win over Democrat Hillary Clinton, his conservative judicial record, and revenge on behalf of Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
‘‘I swear today, under oath, before the Senate and the nation, before my family and God, I am innocent of this charge,’’ he said.
Ford, a psychology professor at Palo Alto University in California, said over four hours of testimony that a drunken Kavanaugh attacked her and tried to remove her clothing at a gathering of teenagers when he was 17 and she was 15.
When Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein asked her if it could be a case of mistaken identity, as Kavanaugh and some Republican senators have suggested, Ford replied: ‘‘Absolutely not.’’