September 15, 2019

Democratic Presidential Candidates Are Calling for Brett Kavanaugh’s Impeachment

Kamala Harris says he “lied to the U.S. Senate and most importantly to the American people.”

Chip Somodevill/Getty

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On two separate occasions, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh exposed himself to classmates at Yale University in the 1980s, according to new reporting from New York Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly. 

The two published details of the incidents, one of which involved Deborah Ramirez, whose allegations were not fully investigated during Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings in 2018, in their new book, The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation. The Times published an excerpt of the book on Saturday. In it, they say have found seven sources who were familiar with Ramirez’s allegations that Kavanaugh “pulled down his pants and thrust his penis at her” at a party. They also detail a previously unreported story that Kavanaugh attended another party “where friends pushed his penis into the hand of a female student.”

Democratic presidential candidates including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), former U.S. Representative Beto O’Rourke, and former Housing and Urban Development Secretary Julián Castro have called for Kavanaugh to be impeached.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said Brett Kavanaugh “should never have been nominated,” and that he supports “any appropriate constitutional mechanism to hold him accountable.”

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), told ABC’s “This Week” that the FBI investigation into Kavanaugh was a “sham.”

Former Vice President Joe Biden has not commented on the new report. President Donald Trump and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) rushed to Kavanaugh’s defense, with Trump suggesting the Department of Justice should get involved in a possible libel suit. (Needless to say, that’s not how libel law works.)

As the hashtags #KavanaughLied, #ImpeachKavanaugh, and #KavanaughResign trended on Twitter, others weighed in on the possibility that Kavanaugh perjured himself and the implications of his lifetime appointment.

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Managing an independent, nonprofit newsroom is staggeringly hard. There’s no cushion in our budget—no backup revenue, no corporate safety net. We can’t afford to fall short, and we can’t rely on corporations or deep-pocketed interests to fund the fierce, investigative journalism Mother Jones exists to do. That’s why we need you right now. Please chip in to help close the gap.

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