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Cotton: Democrats Disgraced Senate in 'Orchestrated Smear Campaign' Against Kavanaugh

September 30, 2018

Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) said on Sunday that Democrats have disgraced the United States Senate in their orchestrated smear campaign against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

"The Democrats have disgraced this process and the United States Senate in the orchestrated smear campaign of character assassination they've run against Judge Kavanaugh," Cotton told "Face the Nation" host John Dickerson.

Kavanaugh has faced a series of sexual misconduct allegations that, according to the accusers, occurred decades ago. Ford told the Washington Post that Kavanaugh, then a junior in high school, attacked her when they were at a party in Maryland in the early 1980s. A second allegation came from a woman named Deborah Ramirez who accused Kavanaugh of exposing himself at a dorm party during his freshmen year at Yale. Another allegation was brought forth from a woman named Julie Swetnick, who is represented by anti-Trump lawyer Michael Avenatti. Swetnick claimed Kavanaugh committed a series of "gang rapes" when he was in high school, but she offered no additional evidence or witnesses to support her allegations.

Kavanaugh has vehemently denied all accusations and there have been no corroborating witnesses to the assaults.

Senate Democrats have called the allegations credible and have stated that Kavanaugh doesn't get the presumption of innocence.

Kavanaugh passed through the Senate Judiciary Committee on Friday but under the stipulation from Sen. Jeff Flake (R., Ariz.) that the FBI conducts an investigation for one week that is "limited in time and scope to the current allegations" against Kavanaugh.

President Donald Trump ordered the FBI to conduct a supplemental investigation into the sexual misconduct allegations against Kavanaugh, stipulating the probe be limited and completed within one week.

Cotton signaled out ranking member on the committee Sen. Diane Feinstein (D., Calif.) on how she handled the controversy from the beginning.

There is a well established process of confidentiality on the committee. Dianne Feinstein could have showed that letter to Chuck Grassley and the two of them, as the leaders of that committee could have shared it with the FBI who could have discreetly conducted this inquiry in July and in August without betraying Miss Ford's confidences. And they have betrayed her. They pointed her to lawyers who lied to her and did not tell her that the committee staff was willing to go to California to interview her. Now all of that is water under the bridge. Those lawyers are going to face a D.C. bar investigation into their misconduct. Dianne Feinstein and her staff is going to face an investigation for why they leaked that. All of this could have been done discreetly – it happens hundreds of times every year in the Judiciary Committee.

Cotton believes the FBI won't uncover any new evidence or proof in their investigation.

"If there's some shocking new bit of, not accusation, but evidence and proof, then of course I'm open to evaluating that evidence. But I said I strongly suspect that every statement that was made to the Judiciary Committee under penalty of perjury is the exact same statement that’s going to be made to the FBI," Cotton said.