“Obviously if Judge Kavanaugh has lied about what happened that would be disqualifying.”
Republican Sen. Susan Collins makes it clear what’s at stake on Thursday. That’s when Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and his accuser Christine Blasey Ford will go head-to-head in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The hearing sets up a potential show down on Capitol Hill, the likes of which have not been seen since Clarence Thomas and Anita Hill testified in 1991 after she accused him of sexual harassment. Thomas was ultimately confirmed after a bitter and bruising battle.
But the Kavanaugh-Ford hearing comes more than 25 years later, amid the #MeToo movement, and when women have been energized after the election of Donald Trump as president.
Republicans were under heavy political pressure – including some from members of their own party – to hold a public hearing and they finally caved on the issue Monday evening.
Key votes for the GOP – including Sens. Susan Collins, Jeff Flake and Lisa Murkowski – were calling for a delay after Ford publicly identified herself in an explosive Washington Post interview on Sunday.
Republicans can only afford to lose one of of their own should every Democrat vote no on Kavanaugh.
The hearing date also comes as Kavanaugh is denying he was at the high school party in question where Ford said he attempted to rape her as a friend watched when they were both students in suburban Washington D.C. during the 1980s.
Mark Judge, the high school friend of Kavanaugh’s who Ford alleges was in the room during the incident, has come under scrutiny. In Ford’s account, it was Judge jumping on both of them that allowed her to escape.
Judge is a conservative author who has written for publications like the Daily Caller and American Spectator and published the book Wasted: Tales of a Gen X Drunk, in which he describes his experience as a teenage alcoholic.
In her account, Ford alleged that both Judge and Kavanaugh were “stumbling drunk” at the time of the incident. In his book, Judge describes someone named “Bart O’Kavanaugh” puking after drinking too much.
The head of the all-girl private school attended by Ford, Susanna Jones, has circulated a statement to its alumnae in support of Ford, stating “As a school that empowers women to use their voices, we are proud of this alumna for using hers.”
Kavanaugh spoke with Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, for about 10 minutes Monday afternoon, where Kavanaugh denied to him that he was at the high school-era party in question, a Hatch aide told NBC News.
Hatch says Kavanaugh is ‘honest’ and ‘straightforward,’ and he thinks woman who has brought accusation is ‘mixed up.’
Kavanaugh is in the fight for his judicial life as he tries to salvage his Supreme Court nomination. He met with the White House legal team for over nine hours Monday.
The conservative Judicial Crisis Network will launch a $1.5 million ad blitz Monday featuring a female friend of Kavanaugh who has known him for over three decades and attended Yale with him as an undergraduate in an effort to defend his character.