Hearing for Supreme Court nominee disrupted by protests

A CONFIRMATION hearing for Donald Trump’s latest nominee to the US Supreme Court descended into chaos as Democrats tried to halt proceedings and protesters repeatedly interrupted.

Brett Kavanaugh was being grilled by the Senate judiciary committee at the start of four days of hearings.

The protesters included a group of women dressed as characters from The

Handmaid’s Tale, who denounced Judge Kavanaugh as “anti-abortion, anti-healthcare, and anti-women”.

As protests grew increasingly heated the judge’s two young daughters, Margaret and Liza, were escorted out of the hearing.

If confirmed, Judge Kavanaugh, 53, would shift the closely divided court of nine justices to the Right, potentially for a generation. But in his opening remarks the judge told the committee he would be a “pro-law judge” who would not decide cases based on his personal views.

He said: “A good judge must be an umpire, a neutral and impartial arbiter who favours no litigant or policy. I would always strive to be a team player on the Team of Nine.”

Democrats said they wanted to review 100,000 documents about the judge’s record that had been withheld by the White House. They also wanted to delay proceedings to examine 42,000 other documents only released to the committee on a confidential basis on the eve of the hearing.

Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat senator, said the process had been “tainted and stained forever” due to the withholding of documents by the White House.

Judge Kavanaugh sat silently, occasionally sipping water and taking notes, as protesters repeatedly stood, one by one, to harangue the hearing. One woman shouted: “This is a mockery and a travesty of justice. Cancel Brett Kavanaugh!” Orrin Hatch, a Republican senator, said: “These people are so out of line they shouldn’t be in the doggone room.”

John Cornyn, another Republican senator, denounced what he called “mob rule”. But Dick Durbin, a Democrat senator, said: “This is what we hear when free people stand up to speak.”

Republican campaign officials denounced angry speeches by Democrat senators on the committee as “grandstanding”.

Judge Kavanaugh has served for 12 years on the appeals court in Washington, the second most important US court after the Supreme Court.

He previously worked in George W Bush’s White House, and for Kenneth Starr, the independent counsel who investigated Bill Clinton in the Nineties.