feelingbluepolitics:

Opinion | Elizabeth Warren’s new, tantalizing claim about Kavanaugh shows what utter madness this is

“On the Senate floor late Thursday, Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) made a new and tantalizing claim about what’s in the FBI documents on Brett M. Kavanaugh that all senators have now reviewed. Senators are severely limited in what they can say about these documents, which are summaries of the interviews that the FBI conducted as part of their renewed background check into Kavanaugh, after Christine Blasey Ford went public with charges that he sexually assaulted her, which led to a host of new claims like that one and others about his drinking at the time.

“Warren noted these limitations and said the following (emphasis added):

“’Senators have been muzzled. So I will now say three things that committee staff has explained are permissible to say without violating committee rules. … One: This was not a full and fair investigation. It was sharply limited in scope and did not explore the relevant confirming facts. Two: The available documents do not exonerate Mr. Kavanaugh.

”‘And three: the available documents contradict statements Mr. Kavanaugh made under oath. I would like to back up these points with explicit statements from the FBI documents — explicit statements that should be available for the American people to see. But the Republicans have locked the documents behind closed doors.’

“Warren, then, appears to have consulted with Judiciary Committee lawyers and was seemingly told that per the rules, she could divulge just this much about what is in the documents, and not a syllable more. At a minimum, Warren appears to be suggesting that there is material gathered from these FBI interviews that demonstrates that Kavanaugh lied to the committee.

…“It’s more than a little troubling that the Senate is going to vote on something as important as a Supreme Court nomination with the American people entirely in the dark on the matter.” [Stephen Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas at Austin]