Feinstein’s handling of letter criticized
Timing of disclosure questioned; Kavanaugh denies alleged sexual misconduct while in high school
When a secret letter detailing a harrowing allegation of attempted sexual assault by Trump Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh made its way to the desk of Sen. Dianne Feinstein this summer, it might have seemed like the latest in a string of revelations that have taken down powerful men.
But as new details about the allegations emerged Friday, questions about Feinstein’s initial decision to keep the document under wraps — and the timing of this week’s disclosure — undermined the impact of its anonymous claim, leaving politicians on both sides of the aisle second-guessing Feinstein’s move.
The author of the letter, a Bay
Area woman who has not been named, accused the judge of holding her down and attempting to force himself on her at a decades-old party when they were both in high school in Bethesda, Maryland, according to reports in The New Yorker and The New York Times. She wrote that he put his hand on her mouth and he and a classmate turned up the music to drown out her protests before she managed to free herself.
“I categorically and unequivocally deny this allegation,” Kavanaugh said in a statement Friday provided by the White House. “I did not do this back in high school or at any time.” The classmate also denied the woman’s account.
Feinstein faced a difficult calculus over the accusation as she organized Democratic op-
position to Kavanaugh’s high-stakes nomination. The woman who wrote the July 30 letter — which she originally sent to her congresswoman, Democrat Anna Eshoo of Palo Alto — declined to go public with her accusations, according to Feinstein’s office and other congressional sources. Feinstein’s office told other Democratic senators that the incident was too old to merit public discussion, The New Yorker reported.
Feinstein only referred the letter to the FBI on Wednesday night, after rumors about it trickled out through Capitol Hill circles and in the media this week.
“The Senator took these allegations seriously and believed they should be public,” a Feinstein spokesperson said Friday. “However, the woman in question made it clear she did not want this information to be public. It is critical in matters of sexual misconduct to protect the identity of the victim when they wish to remain anonymous, and the senator did so in this case.”
On Friday, Feinstein faced criticism from both sides of the political aisle for her handling of the letter. Republicans accused her of orchestrating an eleventh-hour attempt to smear Kavanaugh, while liberal critics blasted her for not bringing the allegation to light earlier.
“The claims are wholly unverifiable, and come at the tail-end of a process
that was already marred by ugly innuendo, dishonesty, and the nastiest form of our politics,” said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, in a statement.
State Sen. Kevin de León, who’s challenging Feinstein from the left in this year’s election, said her handling of the document represented “a failure of leadership,” questioning in a statement why she “politely pantomimed her way through last week’s hearing without a single question about the content of Kavanaugh’s character.” He said Feinstein was right to keep the woman’s identity confidential but that the letter’s allegation was crucial for the Senate to consider.
It didn’t appear Friday that the accusation would derail the confirmation of Kavanaugh, who legal experts
believe could shift the Supreme Court to the right for a generation. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said he planned to move ahead with a committee vote on his confirmation next week. His office also released a letter from 65 women who knew Kavanaugh in high school declaring that he treated women with respect.
Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, the two Republicans who will likely cast the swing votes on Kavanaugh’s nomination, didn’t comment on the allegations Friday.
The FBI said it had received the letter from Feinstein and added it to Kavanaugh’s background file but is not launching an investigation.
Feinstein’s defenders
said the five-term senator — who was elected a year after the firestorm over Anita Hill’s sexual harassment allegations against Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas in 1991 — was focused on protecting the woman who made the accusation.
Darry Sragow, a California political consultant who ran Feinstein’s first statewide campaign for office in 1990, said he thought the senator handled the controversy with the necessary sensitivity.
“She is someone who proceeds softly and carefully and takes very measured steps,” he said. “Anyone who is in her position owes it to themselves to think through very carefully what the repercussions of proceeding are, not rush into it.”
But the episode only
reinforced suspicions of Feinstein among some liberals who think she hasn’t done enough to stand up to the Trump administration. During Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings, she had a more muted presence than several of her colleagues, who interrupted proceedings and inveighed against the nominee.
“Releasing the letter sooner rather than later would have been better,” said Emi Guereca, the president of the liberal activist group Women’s March California. With White House officials already refusing to release many documents about Kavanaugh’s record, she said, “We don’t need our senator withholding information too.”