Trump orders one-week FBI probe
Kavanaugh survives Judiciary Committee’s 11-10 party-line vote.
President Donald Trump on Friday directed the FBI to launch a supplemental background investigation of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to seek additional information on Kavanaugh’s alleged sexual misconduct while he was a teenager.
Trump says in a statement that the updated investigation, which comes in response to sexual misconduct allegations, “must be limited in scope” and “completed in less than one week.”
The decision marks a reversal for the administration, which had argued that Kavanaugh had already been vetted.
Trump’s statement came after Senate Republican leaders agreed to ask to reopen the FBI background investigation into Kavanaugh.
Two key Republicans suggested they would not vote to confirm him to the Supreme Court without further investigation.
The Senate Judiciary Committee voted along party lines to advance Kavanaugh’s nomination, after securing a vote from Sen. Jeff Flake , R-Ariz., who asked for a delay of up to a week before the full Senate decides the judge’s fate.
While the timing of the floor vote is up to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Senate Judiciary Chair- man Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said he would advocate for Flake’s request.
“This is all a gentlemen’s and women’s agreement,” Grassley said after the committee vote.
Another senator considered a swing vote on the floor, Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, said she agrees with Flake, leaving GOP leaders little choice but to slow down the process, given their slim 51-49 margin in the chamber.
Republican leaders said they still plan to move ahead with a procedural vote on Kavanaugh’s nomination today.
The 11-to-10 committee vote came a day after hearing riveting testimony from Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who has accused President Don- ald Trump’s nominee of sexual assault at a house party in Maryland in the early 1980s.
Following F lake’s announcement, both Murkowski and Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-W.Va., indicated that they support his call for a delay.
“The American people have been pulled apart by this entire spectacle and we need to take time to address these claims independently, so that our country can have confidence in the outcome of this vote,” Manchin said in a statement. “It is what is right and fair for Dr. Ford, Judge Kavanaugh, and the American people.”
The move by Flake, a frequent Trump critic who is retiring from the Senate after this year, was cheered by several Democrats, including Sen. Chris Coons of Delaware, a fellow member of the Judi- ciary Committee.
“He and I don’t share a lot of political views but we share a deep concern for the health of this institution and what it means to the rest of the world and the country,” said Coons, who huddled with Flake before he announced his position.
As Kavanaugh’s nomination heads to the floor, his prospects remain unclear in the full Senate.
Two other senators considered swing votes — Susan Collins of Maine and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota — remained silent about their intentions Friday.
Meanwhile, another redstate Democrat, Sen. Joe Donnelly, D-Ind., announced Friday that he would oppose Kavanaugh’s nomination. Republicans had been courting Donnelly, one of three Democrats, along with Manchin and Heitkamp, who supported previous Trump Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch.
“I have deep reservations about Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination to this lifetime position and ... we have been unable to get all the informa- tion necessary regarding this nomination, despite my best efforts,” Donnelly said in a statement. “Only 113 peo- ple have ever served on the Supreme Court, and I believe that we must do our level best to protect its sanctity.”
Mark Judge, a friend and high school classmate of Kava- naugh, is likely to be a prom- inent figure in any inquiry by the FBI. Ford claims he was present when Kavana- ugh allegedly attacked her. Another Kavanaugh accuser also alleges that Judge and Kavanaugh sought on multi- ple occasions in high school to drug inebriated girls for nonconsensual sex with multiple boys — an accusation Kava- naugh has strongly denied.
“If t he FBI or any law enforcement agency requests Mr. Judge’s cooperation, he will answer any and all ques- tions posed to him,” Judge’s lawyer Barbara Van Gelder said.
Judge met with his lawyer Friday morning in Wash- ington, after returning from being holed up in a Bethany Beach, Delaware, home. The Washington Post found him there on Monday, where his lawyer said he had fled to try to avoid an avalanche of press requests and criticism.
Judge told the Senate Judi- ciary Committee on Friday he either does not recall or flatly rejects the allegations about his and Kavanaugh’s behavior in high school.
At the committee vote neared Friday, senators on both sides of the aisle took turns giving their reasons for supporting or opposing Kavanaugh, many in impas- sioned terms.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., declared that judi- cial confirmations would now be starkly different going forward, noting the “process before Kavanaugh, and the process after Kavanaugh.”
“I can say about Ms. Ford, I feel sorry for her, and I do believe something happened to her, and I don’t know when and where,” Graham said. “But I don’t believe it was Brett Kavanaugh.”
Shortly after the Judiciary Committee convened Friday, the panel voted down a motion on party lines by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., to subpoena Judge, who had said he does not want to be part of a committee hearing.
The committee then voted, again along party lines, to decide on Kavanaugh’s nomination at 1:30 p.m. The votes prompted outrage from Democrats.
“This is just totally ridiculous. What a railroad job,” said Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii.
Several Senate Democrats — including Blumenthal, Hirono, Sen. Kamala Harris of California, and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island — walked out in protest.
Underscoring the acrimony surrounding Friday’s proceedings, a dozen House Democratic women who gathered to watch the Judiciary Committee stood up in the room in protest.
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., later told reporters that she thinks Trump “is trying to break the MeToo movement” with his continued support for Kavanaugh.
Before the committee meeting, White House officials fanned out across morning television shows to tout Kavanaugh’s fiery performance in Thursday’s hearing and press the Senate to vote.
“I think he was incredibly powerful and very clear,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said of Kavanaugh during an appearance on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”
She suggested that Ford was mistaken about her attacker and said Kavanaugh has “been unequivocal since Day One that this did not take place by him.”
Rachel Mitchell, the outside counsel hired by Republicans to question Ford, told GOP senators in a closed-door meeting Thursday night that she would not have prosecuted the matter because there was no corroborating evidence, according to two GOP sources familiar with her presentation. She also told the senators that Ford was a compelling witness who had clearly suffered trauma.