In response to the third day of the hearing on the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court, People For the American Way Executive Vice President Marge Baker issued the following statement:
“After two days of questioning before the Senate Judiciary Committee, it’s clear that Brett Kavanaugh did not meet the burden of demonstrating his fitness for a lifetime seat on our nation’s highest court. On issue after issue, he hedged, bobbed and weaved to avoid answering simple factual questions. In short he did exactly what one would expect from a nominee trying to brush past his extreme record on his way to a lifetime seat that he’d use to gut Roe, dismantle the ACA, favor corporations and the wealthy over the rights of ordinary people, and refuse to be a check on presidential power. Brett Kavanaugh can pretend he has an open mind on these issues, but the rest of us—including Senators like Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski—are under no obligation to ignore the clear evidence to the contrary.
“Senator Grassley, for his part, has done everything in his power to assist Senators who want to close their eyes to the obvious truth that Brett Kavanaugh is exactly who Donald Trump and his other right-wing supporters say he is. As the documents we’ve seen today made clear, Grassley has gone out of his way to rig the process in order to hide Kavanaugh's records. He did that not because they implicate national security or because they contain personal information but because if the American people were to see them, they wouldn’t like what they saw. Chuck Grassley has shown a contempt for the integrity of the Senate as thorough as what Trump has shown for the integrity of the presidency.
“Finally, while the nominee at the front of the room did everything he could to obscure the truth, the scores of protestors inside the room—in addition to the thousands outside and the millions across the country—have been steadfastly calling attention to what’s actually at stake. Senators might be impressed by Brett Kavanaugh’s nice guy demeanor, but it’s the people with preexisting conditions who will die without health coverage, the women who will be denied access to comprehensive reproductive health care including abortion, the voters who will find more barriers to the ballot box, the workers who will be denied justice on the job and the consumers who will find their rights trampled on by powerful corporations and big banks that this fight is all about.”
PFAW is also publishing regular fact checks throughout the hearings. Here are selected fact checks so far:
- Kavanaugh Follows the Law without Respect to Parties? Nope.
- Grassley Says Kavanaugh’s Time as Staff Secretary is Irrelevant. Kavanaugh Disagrees.
- Judges Just Call Balls and Strikes. Not according to Brett Kavanaugh.
- Kavanaugh Praises U.S. v. Nixon (After Suggesting It Should Be Overturned)
- Yes, the Federalist Society Knows a Lot About Brett Kavanaugh
- Republicans and Kavanaugh Mislead on How Often SCOTUS Adopts Kavanaugh’s Reasoning
People For the American Way is a progressive advocacy organization founded to fight right-wing extremism and defend constitutional values including free expression, religious liberty, equal justice under the law, and the right to meaningfully participate in our democracy. Learn more: https://www.pfaw.org.
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