Nomination of Brett Kavanaugh

Floor Speech

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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, the Judiciary Committee had an extraordinary meeting this morning, and each of us spoke at some length about our reservations or support for the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to be a U.S. Supreme Court Justice. At the end of that meeting, as we were about to take a vote, Senator Jeff Flake, our colleague, announced his decision that he would request and seek a 1-week extension of the vote so there could be an FBI investigation of some of the unanswered questions that still very seriously and urgently demand responses in fact and evidence.

That is a very promising and important step. It has to be a real investigation, not a sham or show. It has to be penetrating and impartial, which the trained professionals of the FBI can do.

I have a lot of confidence that the FBI will do its job and answer those very serious and urgent questions.

The answers are all the more pressing after the extraordinary hearing we held yesterday at the Judiciary Committee. The entire Nation watched as two people told their stories; two very, very different stories and also told in very, very different ways, but let's be very clear. The roles of these individuals and their responsibilities were also very different.

Judge Brett Kavanaugh came before us for a job interview. He has no right to be on the U.S. Supreme Court. It is a privilege of extraordinary magnitude and significance. The position is one of the most important in our country--a lifetime appointment to the highest Court in the land.

Our responsibility in the Judiciary Committee is not to approve just anyone for that job. We should be seeking the best person, a person of intellect and integrity and temperament who will be fair and impartial, objective, and considerate.

I concluded well before the hearing yesterday--it is no secret--that I would oppose Judge Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court.

My opposition was based on his extreme ideological views and judicial philosophy which were amply demonstrated at the previous hearing we had with him. My concern is, he would be a fifth vote to cut back or even overturn Roe v. Wade and stop women from making decisions about when they will become pregnant or have children; stop people from marrying and exercising their right to do so with the person they love; cutting back on consumer rights and workers' rights and environmental objectives; and permitting an imperial Presidency--a President who could decide unilaterally that he believes the law is unconstitutional, and therefore it should not be enforced, meaning that laws protecting millions of Americans who suffer from preexisting conditions like diabetes and heart disease, cancer, mental illness, and, yes, pregnancy would go unprotected, and other rights under the Affordable Care Act. An imperial Presidency giving the power of that kind of unilateral authority is an anathema.

What we saw yesterday went beyond views on substantive issues, and I will be very blunt. What we saw was a man filled with anger, even rage, and self-pity, someone of arrogance, highly intensely partisan, and someone, in my view, temperamentally unfit for the U.S. Supreme Court. In fact, I fear his rancor and animus, his partisan bitterness, which came across so clearly and explicitly in his reference to a leftwing conspiracy; Democrats organized to fight him and dredge dirt to destroy his family, a conspiratorial view of the world that is not only factually totally false but also deeply dangerous and unprecedented in anything we have ever heard from any nominee for any judicial position as long as I have been here and I believe unprecedented also in the Senate's consideration of Supreme Court nominees. He indicated a partisanship that was disrespectful and dangerous.

We saw also a woman who came before us as a sexual assault survivor who was temperamentally almost exactly the opposite. Instead of hostile, she was helpful. Instead of angry, she was calm. Instead of rancorous and arrogant, she was modest and humble.

Like Judge Kavanaugh, her family has been harmed by death threats and other vile, vicious behavior that has no tolerance in a democratic society, and my heart goes out to both families. We should reject threats to both of those families, as we do to anyone else in our society, and I have sympathy for the children and the families on both sides and others who may have been affected in coming forth with truth that relates to this nomination.

The demeanor of Professor-Dr. Christine Blasey Ford was completely distinct and different. She was mesmerizing. Even now, her visage haunts me in her profound honesty. She was credible and powerful in recounting events that caused her untold terror and anguish; events she hid because of the trauma she experienced then and because of many of the fears that cause other survivors of sexual assault to hide the same kinds of assault, the fears of blame and public shaming and character assassination and threats of retaliation and sometimes self-blame or stigma or embarrassment.

In her case, coming forward has made many of those fears a reality, tragically and unfortunately. She has endured the nightmare befallen her and her family simply to serve the public with facts and evidence she believes we should know--we in the Senate, we in America--should take into account before we make a decision on Brett Kavanaugh as the nominee.

So there are profound questions raised by her powerful testimony that need to be answered in the FBI interview. That is the reason the American Bar Association Thursday evening called for postponing a vote on Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court until sexual assault and misconduct allegations made by Dr. Blasey Ford and others are fully investigated and why separately the magazine of the Jesuit Order in the United States, America, withdrew its endorsement of Judge Kavanaugh. He was educated by Jesuits at Georgetown Preparatory School in Maryland, and on Thursday, the editors said the nomination was no longer in the best interest of the country.

I want to quote further the magazine, which said:

If Senate Republicans proceed with his nomination, they will be prioritizing policy aims over a woman's report of assault. Were he to be confirmed without this allegation being firmly disproved, it would hang over future decisions on the Supreme Court for decades and further divide the country.

Approval of Brett Kavanaugh for the U.S. Supreme Court would be a cloud, it would be a stain on the U.S. Supreme Court for generations to come. We do that damage to the Nation's highest Court at our peril whether we are in agreement or disagreement with Brett Kavanaugh on his policy aims, as the magazine said.

We are talking about the fundamental integrity of an institution and our responsibility to uphold that integrity.

In her testimony yesterday, she was convincing not only because of what she knew and recalled in such precise, vivid detail--indeed, highlighting the laughter of Brett Kavanaugh as he groped her and held her down, as he lay on top of her, the laughter from both him and from Mark Judge--but after we heard her compelling and powerful story, in Judge Kavanaugh, we heard several statements that clearly contradict the facts in evidence. They are untruths.

He claimed the FBI had already investigated him because they did a background check six times. The FBI never investigated Dr. Blasey Ford's allegations. It never investigated Deborah Ramirez's allegations. It never investigated Julie Swetnick's allegations. In fact, the ABA highlights this point.

Senator Grassley said that committee investigators were willing to talk to the witnesses about their allegations, but committee investigators are no substitute for the FBI. The FBI must send those trained professionals to talk to these brave survivors who have come forward, and it must talk to Mark Judge.

I offered a motion to subpoena Mark Judge this morning before our committee. The motion was voted down.

The FBI must talk to Mark Judge, who was allegedly in that room with Brett Kavanaugh when he assaulted Dr. Blasey Ford.

We asked Judge Kavanaugh to call for an investigation by the FBI. A person who is innocent would want the FBI to investigate their claims and clear their name. That is what Dr. Blasey Ford wanted. She said so publicly.

When Brett Kavanaugh was asked, he refused to make that same call. The question is, Why? What is he hiding? What is the administration concealing in refusing to disclose more than a million pages of documents that relate to Brett Kavanaugh's service in the Bush White House as Staff Secretary? They bear on his credibility, maybe not on these specific allegations, but on his credibility.

Judge Kavanaugh claimed that polygraphs are not reliable; that the polygraph Dr. Blasey Ford took and passed was meaningless. Yet, on the DC Circuit as a judge, Brett Kavanaugh ruled otherwise. He wrote ``law enforcement agencies use polygraphs to test the credibility of witnesses and criminal defendants.''

As a former U.S. attorney, I know how polygraphs are used to test credibility of witnesses and criminal defendants. They may sometimes be inadmissible. They may be inadmissible generally, but they have a use. Judge Kavanaugh claimed that all four witnesses Dr. Ford identified as being present at the party have said that the sexual assault ``didn't happen,'' but in fact, only one person has said the sexual assault didn't happen. That one person is Brett Kavanaugh. The other three parties identified by Dr. Blasey Ford said they do not remember. There is a big difference between ``do not remember'' and ``it didn't happen.''

The other woman Dr. Blasey Ford named who was there has since publicly stated that she believes Dr. Ford's account. She believes Dr. Ford, and I do too. Judge Kavanaugh tried to give himself an alibi by making it sound like he never drank on weeknights. His own high school calendar, which he provided the committee as evidence, disputes that statement.

During the hearing, he admitted that one of the entries on his calendar from a Thursday signified that he went to a friend's house to drink.

Judge Kavanaugh repeatedly said that he had never in his life had so much to drink that he couldn't remember everything that happened, but numerous people who spent time with him during his high school, college, and law school years confirmed that he frequently drank to excess and sometimes became belligerent.

Judge Kavanaugh claimed that he always treated women ``with dignity and respect''--his words--and yet he and his football friends from high school named one of my constituents, Renate Dolphin, in their yearbook pages, saying they were her ``alumnius,'' in effect, boasting of sexual conquests and objectifying her, demeaning her. That is hardly treating a woman with dignity and respect. Judge Kavanaugh said this reference meant nothing sexual, but Renate Dolphin disagrees. In a quote to the New York Times, she said:

The insinuation is horrible, hurtful, and simply untrue. I pray their daughters are never treated that way.

He said the allegations against him were ``a calculated and orchestrated political hit fueled with apparent pent-up anger about President Trump and the 2016 election.'' He called it ``revenge on behalf of the Clintons.'' He issued a warning--more like a threat--that ``what goes around comes around.'' That threat to the Judiciary Committee of the U.S. Senate is a threat to America. It is profoundly and deeply dangerous to think that litigants will come before his court with the threat that their political views will determine how he decides their cases. That is antithetical to the basic fundamental principles of this country. It contravenes the entire concept of an independent judiciary. President Trump has demonstrated his contempt for the rule of law and an independent judiciary, but a member of one of the highest courts in the country doing so is chilling. It is stunning. It is staggering.

My Republican colleagues, unfortunately, followed that example. They said we leaked her letters to the press at the last minute to derail Judge Kavanaugh's nomination. They called the allegation against Judge Kavanaugh a coordinated smear campaign. That contention is false. It implies that these courageous survivors of sexual assault are puppets or pawns orchestrated by politicians. Anybody who heard and saw Dr. Blasey Ford yesterday knows that is blatantly false. She came forward on her own initiative. She did it reluctantly, foreseeing the nightmare that would befall her and her family. She did it without encouragement from any Member of the U.S. Senate or any other political figure. That contention is an insult to her and all survivors of this horrific crime. Is Deborah Ramirez's story, too, a fabricated allegation to take down Judge Kavanaugh?

When Senator Harris asked Judge Kavanaugh if he had listened to Dr. Ford's testimony, he said: ``I did not.'' He should have. He should have listened to her testimony. He should have heard and heeded what Deborah Ramirez said about his sexual misconduct toward her and, likewise, Julie Swetnick, about the chilling acts that she alleged that he was involved in performing.

Judge Kavanaugh and my Republican colleagues say they don't dispute that Dr. Blasey Ford may have been sexually assaulted at some point but by some other person, just not Brett Kavanaugh. Maybe she was mixed up. Maybe she was confused. Those kinds of words used to describe her and other sexual assault victims demonstrate the disrespect and disregard that has shamed and silenced so many sexual assault survivors from coming forward to tell their truth, seek prosecution, and consult their parents or loved ones and seek healing. It is the reason that sexual assault is one of the most underreported crimes in our country. One out of every three women is a survivor, but so very few come forward because of the public shaming, character assassination, and threats and rejections they fear and, in fact, they rightly foresee.

To my friends on the other side of the aisle, you cannot have it both ways. You either believe Dr. Blasey Ford or you reject her testimony. Either you accept her veracity or you don't. Dr. Blasey Ford was asked whether it was possible that she confused her attacker, whether there was mistaken identity, or whether there was maybe someone else other than Brett Kavanaugh. Firmly, unequivocally, repeatedly, she said no. Before us and the entire country, she said she was ``100 percent'' sure that Brett Kavanaugh was her attacker.

This detail is seared in her memory. There is no mistaken identity here. A person so brutally attacked at the age of 15 who admits to these details and also the details that she doesn't remember and insists on the details she does remember doesn't make something like that up out of whole cloth. She came forward at great personal sacrifice. I believe her. I think America believes her.

She testified that she was terrified--that is her word, ``terrified''--to come forward. She was very nearly silenced by her fear. She worried if she told her story that she would be shouted down or vilified by Judge Kavanaugh's defenders and that he would never be held accountable. That fear silences too many survivors. We must prove them wrong. We must hold him accountable.

As I said at the very start, a lifetime appointment and promotion to the Supreme Court is not an entitlement. It is a privilege for the person who is best for that position.

Last Friday, President Trump said about Dr. Blasey Ford's story on Twitter:

I have no doubt that, if the attack on Dr. Ford was as bad as she says, charges would have been immediately filed by local Law Enforcement Authorities by either her or her loving parents. I ask that she bring those filings forward so we can learn the date, time, and place!

President Trump knows better. I hope he knows better. Psychologists have noted, and it is widely known, that there are a number of reasons why survivors opt for silence, such as fear of retaliation and repercussions in the workplace or at home, feelings of self-blame. They are told to dismiss it. They are told by their parents they will be blamed, not the perpetrators. They fear they will not be believed, and they want to forget. They want to put this trauma somewhere deep and dark where it will be a source of less pain.

So Dr. Ford did not share the details of her abuse until a therapy session in 2012. She told her husband early in their relationship, but even he did not know the details of this incident until that therapy session.

That is not uncommon for people who have experienced trauma. In the last few weeks, numerous survivors of sexual assault have stepped forward with their stories to explain why they hid their own trauma. I want to take this opportunity to express my admiration for the survivors who are coming forward now with stories of terrible crimes, of impulses to stay silent, and of fears that they have conquered in coming forward.

I will not read them all now, but I wish for the statements of Lindsey Jones of Connecticut; Tara, who asked that her last name not be used, also of Connecticut; and survivors from other parts of the country who have contacted me just over the past few days be printed in the Record.

These are some of the reasons I decided not to file a police report when I was assaulted at a house party in my teens.

The main reason, however, was that as a teenage girl I had spent my life in a culture that told me I was the least important character in the story of my life. My pain, my truth, my future were all less important than the futures and reputations of the people who assaulted me.

I believed that I must bear at least some of the responsibility for the assault because I had been drinking underage.

And a brief visit to the victim services office of my college only confirmed that belief. I believed that the symptoms of depression and post-traumatic stress following the assault was my own personal failings.

I told myself I was being dramatic, that my inability to just get on with things shouldn't negatively impact the futures of my formers friends.

I even, in a desperate attempt to convince myself that nothing truly terrible had happened, apologized for inconveniencing them and privately accusing them of assault.

You see, I could deal with what happened to me if I was at fault. If it was my fault, I could change my behavior to make sure it never happened again.

If I stayed silent, I could pretend everything was fine and deal with my emotions in private. If I was silent, people wouldn't look at me and see either a victim or a liar.

No one would have to choose sides, everyone I knew would be spared of what side to take, my side, or the side of my rapist.

If I stayed silent and accepted all the blame, I spared myself the additional trauma of watching friends and loved ones choose the sides of the person who assaulted me.

Most importantly, if I convinced myself that nothing illegal had taken place, that it was more of a misunderstanding than an assault, if I convinced myself that it didn't matter anyway, that I didn't really care, then I wouldn't have to face my biggest fear--that no one else would really care, that I didn't really matter.

I was convinced that I could find safety in my silence, but to paraphrase the poet and activist Audre Lorde, my silence did not protect me.

It's been 15 years, and I'm still in pain. And the people who assaulted me have not faced a single consequence.

And meanwhile, especially over the last two years, I continued to find evidence that my teenage self was right--no one cares about the victims of sexual assault.

No one seems to care to the point that in 2018, men who have been credibly accused of sexual assault are leading this nation and their accusers are publicly doubted and verbally eviscerated by the media, the president, and members of the senate judiciary committee.

I am here today because I want all the unheard teenagers girls in this country, past, present, and future, including my two daughters, one of whom is here with me today, every time you speak the truth, you do your part to dismantle a toxic, victim-blaming culture, and the world is better for it. Make them hear you. Thank you Senator Blumenthal, and thank you Dr. Blasey Ford. Tara From Connecticut

Between the ages of 13 and 14, I was raped by a man whose children I used to babysit for.

He used the fact that I loved his children and wanted them in my life against me as he raped me while the children were around us.

I didn't tell--I thought that if I got out of the situation that it would be okay because it was my fault--especially after the first time.

I didn't tell, like he said, nobody would believe me.

They would think that I wanted it.

So I continued on and didn't tell till I got a phone call that he had possibly raped the babysitter after me.

And that was the only thing that got me to come forward and speak up.

I had already not been in the children's life and I needed to stop him from doing it again.

And so we went through and I pressed charges and he ended up getting five years.

And he got out of prison and there were no safeguards to protect anybody and he is back on the streets and I don't know today if I would have spoken up back then until recently.

If I hadn't gotten that phone call, this may still be a secret I keep.

And, you know, because of the more people coming forward-- Dr. Ford, we believe you. We all need to stick together and do what's right because 1 out of 4 girls and 1 out of 6 boys--it's in everybody's family.

And I just ask the Senators to think about if it was your mother or your sister or your daughter, what would you want for them?

And nobody who is falsely accusing somebody would ask for an FBI investigation--in my opinion.

I just--I really think we all need to stick together and demand what she deserves. Emily Malloy From North Carolina

I remember what I was wearing like it was yesterday.

Like a broken record on repeat.

I'll never forget that outfit and what happened to me in those clothes that unforgettable night.

Blue jeans and a bright blue t-shirt. Nothing revealing. Nothing slutty. Just regular clothes you wear to a high school football game.

It was senior year. I was with one of my high school friends and we had just gotten invited to a after game party.

I wish I would have listened to my gut that night, but I ignored that voice in my head like the plague.

I was pressured into going to this party by my friend and I was staying at her house that night . . . little did I know I'd never get to her house. There we were.

Beer and loud rap music. I was surrounded by people I knew.

Yes I drank. Yes I got drunk. What happened later that night ISN'T my fault and it took me 11 years so believe that.

Three guys I knew. Three guys I trusted. Three guys lured me into a dark room. One of those guys took my innocence without my consent that night on the cold floor.

I froze. I panicked. I gave in and just let it happened.

What I was left with in the wee hours of the morning, was bruises and a tattered spirit that I'm still healing to this day.

I'm now 31.

I finally told my mom this past fall. I remember mom saying ``I wish you would have told me we could have prosecuted those guys.''

I just hugged her and cried . . . I knew that my chances of justices were slim to none. Anonymous from New Jersey

A decorative emerald green bird in a nest, embellished with gold glitter

An orange shag carpet and a plaid bedspread

An ugly brown wallpaper with golden swirls

A rough wood wall in a darkened hallway between two office buildings

Look at this list. See any connections? I'm guessing that most wouldn't--even an experienced HGTV designer would have difficulty coordinating them or even using them as inspiration for a room makeover.

But I can connect them without hesitation: they're all objects--things I remember--from the times I was violated, molested, or fought through attempted sexual assaults. They are objects from four specific points in time:

A night when I was 6

An afternoon when I was 12

A night when I was newly-16

An afternoon when I was 16

It's bizarre--even to me--to see this list of things together. I've never written it before. I've never spoken openly about the incidents before. But I remember them, each of them. The incidents and the objects. Some violations play like movies in my head from time to time, even 40+ years later. Certain objects, smells, hairdos, and foods can bring a flood of memories--of the teen boys and grown men who attacked me. And each time it happens, it's like a punch to the gut. Still. Decades later.

When that happens, I want to hold the 6-year-old me and tell her that the pedophile teen was a crafty opportunist that night--and it was not her fault. I didn't report it because I didn't have the words.

I want to comfort the 12-year-old me and tell her that the 17-year-old who physically manifested his interest in her prepubescent body should have been nowhere near her--and it was not her fault.

I didn't report it because I was told by him that it would ruin his life.

I want to tell the newly-16-year-old me that the drunken upperclassman who followed her into the bathroom at a party to was an insecure, aggressive guy who was incapable of handling rejection--and it was not her fault.

I didn't report it because I had been drinking and didn't want to get in trouble.

I want to tell the 16-year-old me that the 40-something- year-old man who pinned her against the wall, shoved his tongue down her throat, and groped her was a sick individual--and it was not her fault.

I didn't report it because I was told by the adult I confided in that the man would go to jail; and since he was a husband and a father of young children, it would ruin his life. This is the first time I've written it all out--the things that happened and why I didn't report them. And I know there are millions of unwritten stories and unspoken memories just like mine--from all over the world.

We haven't been heard, but we exist. And since the #metoo movement we've realized that we're not alone. We're not voiceless. We're not powerless. We're finally learning to say ``me too.''

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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Madam President, let me conclude with this thought. Dr. Blasey Ford is a profile in courage. Her name will be remembered long after many of ours are forgotten. She will be in the history books as a teacher--she is a teacher by profession--for this teaching moment for America. It is a teaching moment for all of us--for women who need perhaps that inspiration and role model to come forward and to know that they will be embraced, not rejected. They will be believed, not shunned. They will be bolstered and heeded, and their perpetrator will be held accountable. It is a teaching moment for men--all of us--that we need to do better. It is also a teaching moment for young men--high school juniors and seniors, like Brett Kavanaugh was. When he put into his yearbook that hurtful, horrible phrase about Renate Dolphin--in effect, laughing at her and ridiculing that young woman, just as he laughed and ridiculed Dr. Blasey Ford, then 15 years old, as he allegedly was on top of her, groping and trying to undress her--that laughter was the detail that continued to ring in the ears of Dr. Blasey Ford. It was the most identifiable fact about that incident, as she said yesterday: That laughter is what I hear when I see that entry in the yearbook.

So to all of us men and women in America, her profile in courage should send a message. We should be proud of her, and no one should be prouder than her two sons. I say to Dr. Blasey Ford's sons, as I did this morning in the Judiciary Committee meeting: You should be proud of your mom. She is an American woman who stood strong and spoke out and fearlessly and relentlessly insisted on America hearing her story-- well, maybe not fearlessly. She had fear, but she conquered it. That is the definition of courage--not to be without fear but to act courageously in spite of it. Grace under pressure--that is Christine Blasey Ford.

I expressed my gratitude that I think is shared by many in America for that great teaching moment yesterday. We should honor her by acting in a way that keeps faith with her honesty and bravery.

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