New York Times reporter Robin Pogrebin, the co-author of a new book about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, said the alleged victim of a claim of sexual misconduct against Kavanaugh doesn't remember the incident because "she was drunk."
Pogrebin described the incident as "a drunken party and it's conceivable that people don't always remember what happens in a situation like that," during an appearance on CNN's New Day Tuesday morning.
"We've been talking about this other revelation. Not Debbie Ramirez, not Christine Blasey Ford, but a third woman who eyewitnesses or an eyewitness says the same thing that happened to Debbie Ramirez, which is Brett Kavanaugh exposing himself and forcing his body onto a woman, happened at yet another party," host Alisyn Camerota said. "One more time: Did you speak to that woman?"
"I tried to reach her, and she had no interest in addressing these allegations," Pogrebin said.
"She was a close friend of Deborah Ramirez, one of her best friends. And so she ultimately drafted a statement about her support of Deborah Ramirez and Deborah Ramirez's integrity and basically guilelessness and why she would have no motivation to make up a story like this," she added.
"Why wouldn't this woman speak about her own experience?" Camerota asked.
"My sense is from those who know her is that she doesn't remember it," Pogrebin responded. "I mean, let's remember this was a drunken party and it's conceivable that people don't always remember what happens in a situation like that. A lot of drunken people, you know, Brett was taken over to her by his friends. They were drunk, she was drunk. They put his penis in her hand."
Over the weekend, the New York Times ran an essay adapted from the new book, The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation, co-written by Pogrebin and fellow Times reporter Kate Kelly. The essay reported a new allegation of sexual misconduct against Justice Kavanaugh. "A classmate, Max Stier, saw Mr. Kavanaugh with his pants down at a different drunken dorm party, where friends pushed his penis into the hand of a female student," the pair of reporters wrote.
A subsequent correction to the essay clarified the victim in the alleged incident did not want to talk with the reporters, and friends said she did not remember the incident.
Pogrebin told Camerota she and Kelly believed the allegation was meaningful because Stier, the witness of the alleged event, was unable to contact investigators during the FBI's investigation into the allegations against Kavanaugh last October.
"Senator Chris Coons (D., Del.) wrote a letter to Christopher Wray, the FBI director, specifically directing him to speak to Max Stier early last October while the FBI investigation was underway, this because Stier was not having luck getting through to the investigating authorities," Kelly said.
"Why won't Max Stier come forward publicly to talk about this if he felt so strongly?" Camerota asked the two reporters.
"Max Stier feels like he did his duty with this account, which is an eyewitness account, something he saw," Pogrebin said. "He thought it was important to the process. He went to the relevant authorities. Once Kavanaugh was confirmed, his work was done. Once this guy was on the Court, he had no interest in making this a public issue."