White House widens scope of FBI probe
WASHINGTON — The White House authorized the FBI to expand its abbreviated investigation into sexual misconduct allegations against Judge Brett Kavanaugh by interviewing anyone it deems necessary as long as the review is finished by the end of the week, according to two people briefed on the matter.
At an event Monday celebrating a new trade deal with Canada and Mexico, President Trump said he instructed his White House counsel, Don McGahn, over the weekend to instruct the FBI to carry out an open investigation, but the president included the caveat that the inquiry should accommodate the desires of Senate Republicans.
The new directive came after a backlash from Democrats, who criticized the White House for limiting the scope of the bureau’s investigation into Kavanaugh, Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court. The FBI has already interviewed the four witnesses it was originally asked to question, and on Monday it reached out to others.
The broadening inquiry produced an unusual spectacle as friends and classmates from Kavanaugh’s past provided dueling portraits of the nominee in his younger days — either a goodnatured student incapable of the alleged behavior or a stumbling drunk who could easily have blacked out and forgotten inappropriate behavior at alcohol-soaked parties.
How far the FBI will now delve into these questions beyond the original high school-era sexual assault allegation lodged by Christine Blasey Ford remained unclear. Senate Democrats sent the bureau a list of two dozen witnesses they insisted must be interviewed for an inquiry to be credible. Another accuser, Deborah Ramirez, has given the bureau the names of more than 20 people she said witnessed Kavanaugh exposing himself during a college party or heard about it at the time or later, according to someone involved in the investigation.
Trump said Monday that he wanted a “comprehensive” FBI investigation and had no problem if the bureau wanted to question Kavanaugh or even a third accuser, Julie Swetnick, who was left off the initial witness list, if she seemed credible. His only concerns he said, were that the investigation be wrapped up quickly and that it take direction from the Senate Republicans who will determine whether Kavanaugh is confirmed.
“The FBI should interview anybody that they want within reason, but you have to say within reason,” Trump told reporters in the Rose Garden. “But they should also be guided, and I’m being guided, by what the senators are looking for.”
The revised White House instructions amounted to a risky bet that the FBI will not find anything new in the next four days that could change the public view of the allegations. Republicans have resisted an open-ended investigation that could head in unpredictable directions, and the limited time frame could make it harder for the FBI to resolve the conflicting accounts.