Trump judge laughed as he tried to rape me says professor
Dramatic testimony at crunch Senate hearing
A WOMAN who accuses Donald Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court of trying to rape her when she was 15 told a hearing yesterday how he laughed drunkenly as he carried out the attack.
Her voice breaking with emotion as she gave evidence to a high-stakes hearing at the Senate in Washington DC, Christine Blasey Ford said the alleged assault by Brett Kavanaugh ‘damaged my life’.
Dr Ford, a 51-year-old university professor, said she was ‘terrified’ to be questioned by the Senate Judiciary Committee, but felt she had to do her ‘civic duty’ by revealing how Mr Kavanaugh had once thrown her on a bed and tried to rip off her clothes.
He attacked her so forcefully she had feared he might accidentally kill her, she claimed.
Senators were seen wiping their eyes in the Capitol Hill hearing room as Dr Ford spoke powerfully about the 1982 incident she said had remained ‘seared into my memory’.
Giving his own testimony later, Mr Kavanaugh also fought back tears as he branded the allegations a ‘grotesque and obvious character assassination’. Accused: Brett Kavanaugh arrives with his wife Ashley
Dr Ford was speaking in public for the first time since she dramatically upended Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination to America’s highest judicial body by alleging he sexually assaulted her at a high school party.
Two other women have since come forward with their own claims about Mr Kavanaugh, which he has vigorously denied.
His nomination to a nine-member court that has the final say on key issues such as abortion, immigration and gun rights must be approved by the US Senate, where the Republicans have only a slim majority.
With crucial congressional elections looming in November, some Republican senators have wavered in their support for the conservative judge and were waiting to see how convincing Dr Ford – and Mr Kavanaugh – would prove to be in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Mr Trump has accused Democrats of exploiting the claims for political ends, but he has also said he could be swayed by the hearing into withdrawing the judge’s nomination.
Although the only other witness to the attack – Mr Kavanaugh’s friend, Mark Judge – has rejected her claims, Dr Ford proved a convincing witness.
She was able to describe the alleged incident in detail, even recalling the bed’s exact position in the room, although she admitted she couldn’t remember the precise house or date.
Like Mr Kavanaugh, who was then 17, she was on her summer holidays at the time.
Dr Ford, a married mother of two and respected psychology professor, said she had spent the day swimming before she and a girlfriend joined four boys at a small house party that evening.
When she went upstairs to the lavatory, Mr Kavanaugh and Mr Judge followed her, she said.
While she had drunk just one beer, both of them were ‘visibly drunk’. One of them pushed her into a bedroom and they followed, locking the door and turning up the music.
Electoral damage from claims
‘I was pushed on to the bed and Brett got on top of me. He groped me and tried to take off my clothes.’
When she tried to scream, Mr Kavanaugh clamped his hand over her mouth, she recalled. ‘This was what terrified me the most,’ she said. ‘It was hard for me to breathe and I thought that Brett was accidentally going to kill me.’
Dr Ford finally escaped when Mr Judge jumped on top of them, sending all three of them sprawling and allowing her to flee.
Republicans, who have dismissed the allegations against Mr Kavanaugh as a political smear campaign, have questioned why these accusations never came to light years earlier.
Dr Ford said because Mr Kavanaugh hadn’t raped her she tought, ‘I should be able to move on and just pretend that it had never happened.’
However, its effects remained with her, she said. She had suffered panic attacks, anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.
It wasn’t until July this year that she alerted her local senator to the assault, when she read how supporters of Mr Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court nomination were portraying him as a champion of women’s rights.
Dr Ford flatly denied claims she was politically motivated.
She has called for the FBI to investigate her claims.
With even some Republican politicians admitting Dr Ford’s testimony was compelling, Mr Kavanaugh was left with an uphill battle rescuing his nomination – and his career – when he addressed the committee after her.
Reading out his own statement, he unequivocally rejected Dr Ford’s claims, describing them as ‘last-minute smears’ that ‘debase our public discourse’.
He vowed to fight on even if the final vote goes against him.
He added: ‘I’m here today to tell the truth. I have never sexually assaulted anyone – not ever.’
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