Chaos greets Kavanaugh
Shouts mar hearing
The start of Tuesday’s Senate confirmation hearing for Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh erupted in chaos as Democrats demanded an adjournment and protesters interrupted with repeated shouts and were dragged out by police.
As Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) began his opening statements, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) interrupted to ask that the hearing be postponed so senators could review 42,000 pages of documents about Kavanaugh’s time in the George W. Bush White House that were dumped late Monday.
“We cannot possibly move forward, Mr. Chairman,” Harris insisted.
“You are out of order,” Grassley responded.
The Democrats’ objections were greeted by applause from activists in the audience, while some rose to scream objections to Kavanaugh.
They were removed by police, one at a time.
“This is the first confirmation hearing for a Supreme Court justice I’ve seen [subject] to mob rule,” fumed Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas).
According to Capitol Police, 61 individuals were arrested inside the hearing and nine outside.
Sen. Orrin Hatch (RUtah) criticized Democrats who have 2020 presidential aspirations for grandstanding for the cameras.
“They want that coveted TV clip. Frankly, I wish we could drop all that nonsense,” he said.
In the morning, Kavanaugh introduced wife Ashley and daughters Liza and Margaret.
But later, as the protests heated up, Kavanaugh’s daughters were escorted out, according to Fox News.
“I’m sorry your daughters had to endure the political circus of this morning,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).
The kids returned later to hear former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Lisa Blatt, a liberal Democrat and appellate lawyer, argue for Kavanaugh’s confirmation.
Kavanaugh finally got a chance to address the committee seven hours after the hearing began.
“A good judge must be an umpire, a neutral and impartial arbiter who favors no litigant or policy,” he said.
“In our independent Judiciary, the Supreme Court is the last line of defense for the separation of powers, and the rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution.
“The Supreme Court must never be viewed as a partisan institution ... If confirmed to the court, I would be part of a Team of Nine, committed to deciding cases according to the Constitution and laws of the United States. I would always strive to be a team player on the Team of Nine.”
Democrats delivered long monologues complaining about a lack of transparency and raising concerns that Kavanaugh would roll back abortion rights, gun control and shield President Trump from criminal prosecution.
As Kavanaugh spoke, Trump took to Twitter to denounce the Democrats trying to block his nominee.
“The Brett Kavanaugh hearings for the future Justice of the Supreme Court are truly a display of how mean, angry, and despicable the other side is. They will say anything, and are only looking to inflict pain and embarrassment to one of the most highly renowned jurists to ever appear before Congress. So sad to see!” he wrote.
If Tuesday’s “hearing” on the Brett Kavanaugh nomination is how it’s going to be, the Senate might as well quit bothering — or at least stop televising the farce. Kavanaugh’s extensive record — hundreds of opinions, journal articles and so on — are more than enough for senators to make up their minds about how to vote. (And he’s happy to sit down for a chat with any who even pretend to remain unsure.)
Most Democrats already have decided to oppose him. And they’re the ones demanding more documents from his years as a White House functionary — purely in hopes that somewhere they can find something that will look bad enough to prompt some nervous Republican senator to bolt.
This is what Supreme Court confirmations have come to: a purely partisan exercise, with only a few senators at “risk” of voting across party lines.
The trend is bad for the court and bad for the country — not least because it forces presidents of both parties to stick to the pool of Yale-Harvard grads who’ve spent their whole adult lives avoiding anything that might torpedo a confirmation, knowing the other side will Dumpster-dive for dirt going back to their college years.
(Starting with Kavanaugh, the opposition search now includes digging into his wife’s past. Are kids next?)
This nominee has said he’ll broadly respect precedent and decide cases on the merits, which strongly suggests he’ll move the high court a bit to the right. And nothing in the hearings will tell the nation much more than that.
So America gets to watch protesters protesting for the cameras, followed by (zzzz) senators senatorizing for the cameras. Then the nominee will say as little as possible in answer to overly long questions, and eventually comes the vote.
This may be democracy, but it’s not deliberation or debate; it’s a debacle.