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Clinton Spreads 'Four Pinocchio,' 'False' Claim About Kavanaugh

Kamala Harris previously claimed the Supreme Court nominee was 'going after birth control'

Hillary Clinton
Getty Images
September 12, 2018

Former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton repeated a claim about Brett Kavanaugh that multiple fact-checkers have ruled is false.

A ThinkProgress writer first claimed on Twitter that during his Supreme Court confirmation hearing, Kavanaugh "seems to refer to birth control as 'abortion-inducing drugs.'" That claim was picked up by Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris (Calif.), who shared an edited video of the interaction on Twitter and claimed that "this is a dog whistle for going after birth control."

But that claim was ruled "False" by PolitiFact, who pointed out that in context, Kavanauagh was clearly just summarizing the position of a litigant who appeared before him in the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.

"It was a technical matter of filing out a form in that case. But they said filling out the form would make them complicit in the provision of the abortion-inducing drugs that they were, as a religious matter, objected to," Kavanaugh said at the Senate hearing.

"It’s very clear he’s characterizing their position, which was held by all the Catholic organizations within that set of cases," Department of Justice spokeswoman Kerri Kupec told PolitiFact.

The Washington Post fact checker agreed in its own video fact check of Harris' tweet, which gave her "Four Pinocchios," the worst possible rating.

"Kavanaugh was simply using the same language that was included in the dissent," the text on the video reads. "There is little indication he thinks birth control is up to date."

But the next day, Clinton spread the same claim on Twitter. "He referred to birth-control pills as 'abortion-inducing drugs.' That set off a lot of alarm bells for me, and it should for you, too," the former senator and secretary of state wrote.

Clinton called it "a dog whistle to the extreme right," and warned that if Kavanaugh was confirmed, birth control would be outlawed.