Hundreds of agents for FBI probe
Judge’s past to be raked over
HUNDREDS of FBI agents will examine sex assault claims against the judge who President Donald Trump has nominated to sit in the Supreme Court – as the White House races against time to secure the appointment.
Officers want to speak to almost everyone who knew Brett Kavanaugh when he was at school in Maryland, and was a student at Yale University.
The agents were sent into action after the White House caved into pressure to order an investigation in the hope of clearing Mr Kavanaugh’s name ahead of a vote in the Senate.
Much further delay could mean the vote will not take place until after the mid-term elections in November, when the Republicans could lose their narrow majority in the US Senate.
The investigation will centre on claims by Professor Christine Blasey Ford, who last week told the Senate Judiciary Committee that she was sexually assaulted by Judge Kavanaugh when she was 15 and he was 17.
The FBI will also investigate claims by two other women. Deborah Ramirez, who went to Yale with Mr Kavanaugh, alleges he exposed himself at a party and ‘thrust his penis in her face’. Julie Swetnick claims Mr Kavanaugh was at parties where boys ‘gang raped’ women.
The judge, 53, has dismissed both claims as ‘outrageous’ and has strongly denied assaulting any woman.