Trump calls protesters ‘rude elevator screamers’
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump’s nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, looks headed for a lifetime job on the US Supreme Court after two senators said sexual misconduct accusations against him would not prevent them from voting to confirm him.
Republican Susan Collins and Democrat Joe Manchin, both swing votes, said they would support Kavanaugh after weeks of debate about sexual violence and the nominee’s character and temperament that gripped the nation.
A partisan battle became an intense personal and political drama when university professor Christine Blasey Ford accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her when at high school in Maryland in 1982.
Collins said Ford’s accusa- tions “fail to meet the morelikely-than-not standard”.
As protesters in a Capitol Hill hallway shouted, “Shame! Shame! Shame!”, Manchin told reporters an FBI investigation, which did not find corroborating evidence of Ford’s accusations, was thorough.
“I believe Dr Ford. Something happened to Dr Ford. I don’t believe the facts show that it was Brett Kavanaugh, but I believe something happened,” he said.
Mr Trump lashed out at women who confronted senators, labelling them “rude elevator screamers” and “paid professionals only looking to make Senators look bad”.
Two other women also al- leged sexual misconduct by Kavanaugh in the 1980s. He denied those accusations, as well as Ford’s, in angry testimony to a Senate committee.
If confirmed, Kavanaugh would tip the court’s balance to a 5-4 conservative majority in legal battles ahead over issues such as abortion rights, immigration and Trump’s attempt to ban transgender people from the military.
Republicans hold a 51-49 majority in the US Senate and with the two senators choosing to vote in favour of Kavanaugh, the confirmation looked locked in yesterday.
The Kavanaugh fight has riveted Americans just weeks before the November 6 elections in which Democrats are trying to take control of Congress from the Republicans.