Trump White House ‘Chose to Cheat’ to Get Kavanaugh Confirmed

When Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court was rocked by a pair of allegations of past sexual misconduct, the Trump administration announced that a speedy FBI investigation would get to the bottom of what the Senate deemed “credible allegations” against the judge. 

Christine Blasey Ford had alleged an assault by Kavanaugh when they were teenagers, involving Kavanaugh locking her in a room, climbing on top of her, attempting to remove her clothing, and covering her mouth to keep her from screaming. A second woman, Deborah Ramirez, who attended Yale as an undergraduate with Kavanaugh, alleged that he’d exposed himself to her, waggling his penis in front of her face. Kavanaugh “categorically and unequivocally” denied the allegations, which both involved him being drunk.

At the time, Donald Trump himself promised the FBI would have “free rein” to conduct its inquiry, which the Justice Department assured would be “by the book.” The FBI investigation uncovered little and Senate Republicans used it as a fig leaf to confirm the justice, with then-majority leader Sen. Mitch McConnell insisting: “The FBI report did not corroborate any of the allegations against Judge Kavanaugh.”

But a new report from the office of Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) finds that the FBI investigation was “flawed and incomplete,” the agency failed to follow up on leads that could have shed light on Kavanaugh’s alleged misbehavior, and the FBI explicitly did not pursue corroborating evidence. Whitehouse chairs the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Federal Courts.

Far from giving the FBI “free rein,” the report finds that the Trump White House exercised “total control” over the scope of the investigation, as the administration sought to “kneecap” the FBI probe, while misleading the Senate and the public. Perhaps most egregious, calls by the public into an FBI “tip line” about Kavanaugh were never probed by the FBI. Instead, “all tips related to Kavanaugh were forwarded to the White House without investigation.”

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Shortly after the report dropped Tuesday, Rolling Stone spoke to Whitehouse about the FBI process, which he describes as “a sham” designed to “give political cover” to Kavanaugh’s confirmation.

This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

For folks who aren’t fresh on the details of the Kavanaugh confirmation, take us back to why this FBI supplemental background investigation was initiated?

This ball got put in motion by Dr. Blasey Ford coming forward with an allegation that she had been attacked and molested by Brett Kavanaugh when she was a student. That came to light after the initial FBI background check had concluded, and after the initial hearing had taken place.

The Republicans tried to ignore it completely, but one senator wouldn’t put up with that. So the FBI was tasked to go back and do a supplemental background investigation to look into the allegations. And she and Kavanaugh were brought in for a hearing to give their testimony. 

How was this new FBI probe supposed to get to the bottom of things?

We were told, to quote President Trump, that the FBI was going to be given “free rein” to look into the matter — to make whatever inquiries they wanted. And we were reassured by the FBI and the Department of Justice that the entire investigation was being done — “by the book” was the phrase — consistent with the FBI’s longstanding procedures.

And they were looking not only into Blasey Ford’s allegations, but also those from Deborah Ramirez? 

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And others. There were a number of people who came forward with stories about wildly inappropriate activities by Kavanaugh.

So “free rein” and “by the book” was the promise. What was the reality of the process?

“Free rein” was false. Instead of free rein, the FBI had no freedom at all. It was specifically directed by the White House as to every iota of the investigation. And the assurance this was going to be done “by the book” omitted the salient fact that, for a supplemental background investigation, there is no “book.” The rules are simply: Do what the White House tells you. 

The pretense that there was some kind of a standard operating procedure that the FBI would honor was trotted out falsely — in a way that misled the Senate about what was taking place. The FBI indulged the proposition that this had been a legitimate, by “the book,” “free rein” investigation, and the president lied about it.

The end result you’ve described as a “sham.” Can you put some texture to that? 

They ended up with an investigation that was badly flawed. And those flaws turned up in two very specific respects that we found in the report. One was that the FBI was directed not to pursue any corroborating evidence, only direct evidence. 

What would that exclude?

For example, if someone had heard about, the day after, the report of what happened to Debbie Ramirez. It corroborates the direct evidence. Everybody who could corroborate that this guy had a problem with aggressive and inappropriate behavior with women — that was also left out.

What made that particularly galling was how many Republicans, in their comments explaining their vote to confirm Kavanaugh, said that there was “no corroborating evidence.” There was no corroborating evidence because the FBI is not to pursue corroborating evidence. 

And the other flaw had to do with the “tip line.” This is almost unbelievable.

We were told that they would set up a tip line for Kavanaugh. And what we found is that, in fact, they did not. FBI has the general tip line that it runs 24/7. The FBI then had a screening operation set up to pull all the tips that came in that related to Kavanaugh, and basically put them in a bucket and take that bucket up to the White House. They flagged some for the White House that they thought they should pay particular attention to — signaling that they might have merited some attention. And they waited for a signal from the White House to proceed, and they never got a signal. They never investigated a single tip that came through that so-called tip line. So the so-called tip line was a fake. 

What was the political effect of this, of this sham report that you’re describing? 

The political effect was that it gave cover to Republicans to vote for this guy. They could tell their voters at home, ‘Don’t worry. The FBI looked into this. The FBI did it completely by the book, and the FBI had free rein to examine these charges, and there wasn’t even any corroborating evidence. They even let people even send in tips over their tip line.’ That’s the story that the public was told. And every piece of it was propped on a pillar of falsehood.

Help me understand why we’re only getting the full picture six years later. 

The Trump administration basically put up a brick wall, and we got no information from the FBI, despite repeated probing. Under the Biden administration, I ran into the customary uphill slog that the executive branch creates for congressional oversight.

You’ve pursued this to the bitter end. Why is it so important?

When this was going on, I started getting calls from Rhode Islanders like none I have ever received before. Women were calling in to relate incidents of sexual assault that had happened to them, in some cases years ago, in some cases decades ago, and in some cases, they’d never told anyone until they called in to my office or wrote in. 

They wanted me to know this very personal detail of their lives, because they wanted this to be a moment where we came together to make a hard stop to this kind of behavior. They also wanted me to know that their memories of the assault on them were fractured memories, and that I shouldn’t disbelieve Dr. Ford because she couldn’t remember what she had for breakfast that day. That their memory of their assault was shards of memory, like the feel of the guy’s jacket on their face. 

That lined up with another experience that I had, which was that very often in these cases of sexual assault between acquaintances or in a family, it’s very hard to gather the evidence and prove the case. Time has gone by. Physical evidence is lost. Electronic evidence is lost. Witnesses are lost. 

A victim who’s finally screwed up her courage to come and tell somebody, I believe, is entitled to at that point the best goddamn investigation you can pull together — so that at least she knows that somewhere, somebody took her seriously and did their level best. 

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So when this particular allegation was just treated as a political ping pong ball, I think it is demeaning to sexual assault victims everywhere. They could have followed a fair and appropriate search for truth, and follow the same kind of rules that they use for regular background investigations, and for regular criminal investigations. And be true to what they told the public, which you think would be the obvious thing to do. 

Or they could close the deal on a Supreme Court justice who their big donors were clamoring for. And they chose to cheat to close the deal.