Starting today's Kavanaugh thread with this news from : "Four People Told The Senate That Christine Blasey Ford Told Them She Was Sexually Assaulted In High School" —>
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Here are the Kavanaugh calendars. judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/ / What I don't get is what these show. We never pre-planned an informal gathering of 5 or 6 people who ended up going to someone's house in high school after a movie or something, nor did we call it a "party."
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Also, the calendar does show that Kavanaugh was hanging out with the guys who Ford reportedly has said she remembers being in the room/at the house. Here's July 1:
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Here's what we have on the latest, the affidavit from Avanatti's client, Julie Swetnick.
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Michael Avenatti tells me that Julie Swetnick reached out to him for representation and that he has sent her sworn affidavit — where she says Kavanaugh was present at a party where she was gang raped in 1982 — to the Senate Judiciary Committee. twitter.com/MichaelAvenatt…
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Careful correction from a legal-eyed reader: This is a declaration from Swetnick, not an affidavit. It is still made under penalty of perjury, but, unlike an affidavit, does not need a witness from a notary public or the like. Apologies.
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To be clear, I'm not correcting to say it makes a substantive difference in how we read and address it. I'm correcting because I tweeted something that was wrong. Note this:
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Grassley's office confirms that the Judiciary Committee does have and is reviewing Swetnick's declaration.
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Grassley's office: "This morning Michael Avenatti provided a declaration to the Judiciary Committee. Committee lawyers are in the process of reviewing it now."
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Here's our report from on the Swetnick declaration news —> A Third Woman Has Accused Brett Kavanaugh Of Sexual Misconduct, And Said He Was Present When She Was Gang Raped
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Schumer: "I strongly believe Judge Kavanaugh should withdraw from consideration."
Kavanaugh's prepared testimony for Thursday: "These are last-minute smears, pure and simple." judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/
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Per pool, the White House sent the following statement from Judge Brett Kavanaugh, presumably in response to the Swetnick declaration: "This is ridiculous and from the Twilight Zone. I don't know who this is and this never happened."
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And, from Grassley —>
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Grassley says he doesn’t know much about Avenatti and that what’s important is the person “who claims she’s been harmed.”
“Seems to me he wants to protect people who are involved pornography and that he’s running for president,” he says of Avenatti
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This seems so far removed from what's going on now for the Judiciary Committee chair to be saying something like this: "Seems to me he wants to protect people who are involved pornography ..."
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And, here comes Trump — focused on Avenatti, and not Swetnick's claims.
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Avenatti is a third rate lawyer who is good at making false accusations, like he did on me and like he is now doing on Judge Brett Kavanaugh. He is just looking for attention and doesn’t want people to look at his past record and relationships - a total low-life!
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Meanwhile, this seems like one of the least likely things a person could file in court and expect the court to do something with it.
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Democratic Senator Merkley is filing a lawsuit over the Kavanaugh nomination and seeking an injunction on a confirmation vote. He argues the White House has violated the separation of powers by obstructing the Senate's investigation (by withholding documents, for example.)
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Sen. Lindsey Graham has quite a statement out, attacking Michael Avenatti and saying that he "hope[s] people will be highly suspicious of this allegation" brought by Julie Swetnick.
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Flake says he received a death threat against him and his family as a result of calling for additional testimony from Kavanaugh and testimony from Ford. (He noted this after noting death threats faced by others in the process as well.)
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JUST IN: Case is Merkley v. Trump (1:18-cv-02226), filed in US District Court for DC. Other defendants include McConnell, Grassley, NARA, and Bill Burck (who handled the George W. Bush office part of this), as well as the Senate's Secretary and Sergeant as Arms.
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Here's the complaint, in which a US senator is asking a federal judge to order the president to "withdraw his excessive invocation of executive privilege" in a Supreme Court nomination. [First problem: Executive privilege was not technically invoked.] documentcloud.org/documents/4945
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Asked if the three women are lying, @realDonaldTrump responded, "What's your next question."
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WAPO: Mark Judge's one-time girlfriend's attorney has told judiciary that her client's recollection matches what she told the New Yorker (below) and she is prepared to speak to the FBI about it: washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-lin
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White House puts out a new letter of support for Kavanaugh, signed by 60+ people who attended schools in the area and knew Kavanaugh, calling Julie Swetnick's claims "Nonsense." They add: "We never witnessed any behavior that even approaches what is described in this allegation."
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Note: These are many of the same people who signed prior letters, not a new universe of people.
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“It’s a big fat con job,” Trump says of the accusations against Kavanaugh, repeating his line from his tweet that Democrats are laughing behind the scenes about this.
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Asked if the accusers are liars, Trump avoids at first, then says: "And these are all false to me, these are false accusations in certain cases, in certain cases — even the media agrees with that. I can only say that, what they have done to this man is incredible."
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Here is Christine Blasey Ford's written testimony for tomorrow: "I am here today not because I want to be. I am terrified. I am here because I believe it is my civic duty to tell you what happened to me while Brett Kavanaugh and I were in high school." assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4945
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Update: On today's 64-person letter released by the White House, 24 of the 65 signatories from the original women backers of Kavanaugh signed, 28 of the 156 signatories from the original Georgetown Prep letter signed, and 12 names (10 men and 2 women) were new.
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Trump: "I've had numerous accusations about me. I mean they made false statements about me knowing they were false. I never met them. I never met these people. And what did they do, what did they do? They took money in order to say bad things."
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"Well, it does impact my opinion. You know why? Because I've had a lot of false charges made against me," Trump says. "So when you say, does it affect me in terms of my thinking with respect to Judge Kavanaugh. Absolutely, because I've had it many times."
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Trump acted like all of the Kavanaugh accusers would be able to testify before the Senate. Thus far, only Dr. Ford is slated to testify.
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Oh.
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Text blast that just went out from the Trump campaign: “Judge Kavanaugh has become the victim of a televised witch hunt playing out in front of his own family.”
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Per NBC News, a fourth accuser went to Sen. Cory Gardner of Colorado, and Republicans questioned Kavanaugh about it shortly after noon on Tuesday. nbcnews.com/politics/supre
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Also, not to be missed in all of this. —>
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NEWS: At private meeting today, Susan Collins raised serious concerns about latest allegations against Kavanaugh, citing the sworn statement. She also questioned why no subpoena for Mark Judge. GOP leaders sought to reassure her. w/@Phil_Mattingly cnn.com/2018/09/26/pol
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Grassley releases transcripts of two interviews held with Kavanaugh: Sept. 17 —> judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/
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Taylor Foy, the Judiciary Committee spokesperson for the Republicans, sends out the letter referenced in the NBC report. It was anonymous and no one is named besides Kavanaugh. Here is Foy’s statement, and the letter:
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