At Yale, Kavanaugh stayed out of political debates

It was the 1980s at Yale University, and Brett Kavanaugh’s classmates were protesting South Africa’s apartheid system, rallying for gay rights and backing dining hall workers in a labor dispute.

But friends and acquaintances say the future Supreme Court nominee seemed more interested in battles on the basketball court than politically charged debates.

“If you had asked him back then: ‘You have the option of becoming a Supreme Court justice or having a six-year career in the NBA,’ I think he would have picked the NBA,” said Rusty Sullivan, a fellow sportswriter at the college newspaper.

In some ways, Kavanaugh was like many Yale students of his time: a product of a high-powered East Coast prep school who majored in history, then Yale’s most popular major, and headed for law school after graduating in 1987. Interviews with more than a dozen people who knew him in college and Yale Law School draw a portrait of a serious but not showy student and sports lover whose drive and competitiveness helped him both on the court and in the classroom.

But Kavanaugh’s Yale experience wasn’t entirely typical.

He pledged a partyhearty — for Yale — fraternity at a time when Greek life was minimal there; a resurgence would kindle campus debate during his undergraduate years. He also joined an all-male “senior society,” a campus group that selects a handful of students each year for private socializing.

Kavanaugh, who grew up in Bethesda, Md., has said that he came to realize he was headed down a different philosophical path than many of his classmates. At Yale Law, he repeatedly found himself siding with conservative Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist, he recalled in a speech last year to the right-leaning American Enterprise Institute.

“That often meant, in the Yale Law School environment of the time, that I stood alone. Some things don’t change,” said Kavanaugh, who would become the fourth Yale Law graduate sitting on the high court if he’s confirmed.

The White House declined to comment for this story.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is scheduled to begin hearings on the nomination Tuesday.

Classmates don’t recall Kavanaugh as outspoken about his views — “I knew him more as a sports fan than a fan of any political agenda,” says law school friend Jonathan Franklin — and therefore not inclined to take sides in campus controversies such as a 1984 clerical and technical workers’ strike that closed dining halls for weeks.

To friends, Kavanaugh perhaps stood out most for not showcasing himself as a standout on a campus where many students aren’t shy about their intellect and ambition.