Senate
Judiciary Committee Republicans released an executive summary of the
FBI's confidential supplemental background investigation into Supreme
Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh late Thursday, which key swing-vote
senators vowed they would continue to review Friday ahead of a
major vote on his confirmation.
According to the summary of the
report, FBI agents interviewed 10 people and reached out to 11. They
focused exclusively on witnesses with potential first-hand knowledge of
alleged sexual misconduct by Kavanaugh.
"The FBI provided to the
Senate 12 detailed FD-302 reports summarizing their interviews with the
witnesses as well as supporting materials cited by the witnesses during
their interviews," the summary reads. Only senators and top aides are
being allowed to review the full report in a secure facility on Capitol
Hill.
Notably absent from the witness list were any individuals
directly related to the allegations of Julie Swetnick, who claimed in a
sworn statement that she had witnessed Kavanaugh participating in
systemic gang rapes decades ago.
Swetnick's credibility has taken a beating in recent days, with one ex-boyfriend
telling Fox News she "exaggerated everything" and had threatened to kill his unborn child. Another ex-boyfriend
similarly cast doubt on her credibility,
as reports surfaced that she had previously been sued for allegedly
concocting false sexual harassment claims. Swetnick is represented by
anti-Trump lawyer Michael Avenatti.
Among those questioned were
Mark Judge, PJ Smyth, and Leland Keyser, the three individuals Christine
Blasey Ford claimed were present when Kavanaugh allegedly threw her on a
bed and sexually assaulted her sometime in the 1980s (Ford has
variously claimed the episode occurred in the mid-1980s and early 1980s,
before testifying that it occurred in 1982).
"There is no corroboration of the allegations made by Dr. Ford or Ms. Ramirez."
— Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans
All
three of those individuals had already provided statements to the
Judiciary Committee under penalty of felony denying any knowledge of the
alleged assault. Keyser, Ford's lifelong best friend, denied ever
knowing Kavanaugh. When questioned about Keyser's statement at last
Thursday's hearing, Ford suggested Keyser was having serious medical
issues and had apologized for her denial.
Judge was also
questioned "extensively" about other allegations besides Ford's,
according to the Judiciary Committee. Democrats had called for Senate
Republicans to subpoena Judge, a longtime friend of Kavanaugh's, so that
they could question him about the nominee's drinking habits and high
school yearbook references.
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Additionally,
the FBI interviewed two individuals named in Kavanaugh's July 1, 1982
calendar entry, which some observers said could have described the
gathering where Ford was purportedly attacked. Those individuals were
his longtime friend Christopher Garrett and Timothy Gaudette, whose
house Kavanaugh visited for beers on July 1, according to his calendar.
An attorney for one of those witnesses was also interviewed.
Finally,
the FBI interviewed Deborah Ramirez, the woman who claimed in an
explosive New Yorker piece that Kavanaugh had exposed himself to her at a
Yale party. The FBI also interviewed two alleged eyewitnesses
identified by Ramirez, and tried to interview a third, but that
individual refused to cooperate. Agents also interviewed one of
Ramirez's close friends from college.
"The Supplemental Background
Investigation confirms what the Senate Judiciary Committee concluded
after its investigation: there is no corroboration of the allegations
made by Dr. Ford or Ms. Ramirez," the Judiciary Committee Republicans
wrote.
Ramirez had previously acknowledged to The New Yorker that,
as recently as last month, she was not sure Kavanaugh was the one who
exposed himself to her. She then changed her mind after speaking to an
attorney for less than a week, according ot the magazine. Kavanaugh
testified last Thursday that he had heard Ramirez was asking former
classmates at Yale about the alleged episode during the summer,
apparently trying to "refresh" their memories in a manner he implied was
inappropriate.
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One
of Ramirez's lawyers complained on Twitter this week that the FBI did
not appear to be conducting a "serious" investigation because, he
claimed, the agency failed to reach out to some of the dozens of
witnesses he had suggested.
Nevertheless, for several hours on
Thursday, senators from both parties filed in and out of the Capitol
Building's Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF), where
they pored over the FBI's full report in a private, secured setting.
Senators were not allowed to take the report out of the SCIF.
Maine
Republican Sen. Susan Collins, considered a key potential swing vote on
Kavanaugh, said Thursday that the bureau’s supplemental background
probe “appears to be a very thorough investigation.” On Thursday
afternoon, however, she remained in the SCIF for more than an hour and a
half, causing some consternation among Republicans.
“All of that time, she still doesn’t know?” one source asked Fox News.
And
Arizona Republican Sen. Flake, who originally requested the FBI re-open
its investigation into the sexual assault claims leveled against
Kavanaugh by Ford, agreed with Collins' assessment.
“No new
corroborative information came out of it,” Flake said. “Thus far, we’ve
seen no new credible corroboration — no new corroboration at all.”
However,
Flake continued to keep the public guessing, returning to view the
report again and saying he has "more reading" to do. He pulled a
surprise last week when he publicly backed Kavanaugh, then demanded the
FBI probe before a final vote.
Top Democrats, though, minced no
words about the FBI's report, saying the bureau's inquiry should not
have been restricted to one week. President Trump has said the FBI had
the authority to interview "whoever" they wanted, but Democrats also
alleged that the administration had meddled in the investigation.
"Well,
that report -- if that's an investigation, it's a bull----
investigation," Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., told a man as he walked
through the Capitol complex on Thursday. "The reality is, that was not a
full and thorough investigation."
The investigation's one-week
time limit, Flake and other Republicans said, was necessary to avoid
bogging down Kavanaugh's nomination with a never-ending probe into
various uncorroborated, lurid accusations, which all related to alleged
events more than three decades ago. President Trump has said that the
FBI had the authority to interview "whoever" it wanted, but he openly
cast doubt this week on the legitimacy of many claims against Kavanaugh.
Ford's
attorneys also sharply criticized the FBI for not reaching out to
interview their client, who testified at length during Thursday's
hearing. They told Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa,
that they would only turn over Ford's therapist notes if the FBI
interviewed their client.
Ford has extensively cited her 2012
therapy notes as a kind of corroboration for her claims but has not
provided them -- even in part -- to investigators. (The Washington Post
said Ford had shared a "portion" of her notes with their reporters, but
under oath on Thursday, Ford said she could not recall whether she had
actually done so, or merely described the notes).
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Late
Thursday, Grassley ripped into Ford's attorneys for their request, and
suggested in an exasperated letter that they simply wanted to stall
Kavanaugh's confirmation at any cost.
"Your response on behalf of
your client is a non-sequitur," Grassley wrote in the letter. "It’s not
even clear to me what purpose turning over these materials to the FBI
would accomplish. The FBI would simply turn over that evidence to the
Senate. That is precisely the outcome I seek with this request."
Furthermore,
Grassley added, "The U.S. Senate doesn’t control the FBI. If you have
an objection to how the FBI conducts its investigations, take it up with
[FBI] Director [Christopher] Wray."
Grassley concluded by
implying that Ford's attorneys weren't disclosing her therapist notes
because they did not, in fact, back up her claims.
A final vote on
Kavanaugh's confirmation is expected Saturday. A key procedural vote to
end debate on his nomination is set for Friday morning.
