Senate Judiciary Committee member Sheldon Whitehouse on Thursday said that, should Democrats “get gavels” after the midterm elections, they will investigate the FBI and Judge Kavanaugh, even if he gains confirmation to the Supreme Court.
WATCH:
In response to CNN host Jake Tapper’s question about what would happen if Kavanaugh’s accuser does not show up on Monday and the Senate votes to confirm, Whitehouse made the case for an “investigative process” that “should take place.”
“Well, first of all, there’s a factual dispute here which is that she said that young Kavanaugh molested and assaulted her, and he says that he didn’t,” replied the Rhode Island Democrat. “There was a witness in the room who has never been subjected to a proper investigative effort of any kind. He has not been interviewed. He’s never said anything under oath. There were supposedly other boys. There’s a whole investigative process that can and should take place.”
“And you know what?” he continued. “This is such bad practice that even if they were to ram this guy through, as soon as Democrats get gavels we’re going to want to get to the bottom of this. You can’t ignore a crime victim’s claim that something happened, refuse to investigate, throw her up into the stand without the least bit of support for her, without the least bit of effort to corroborate what she says, and then walk away from that as if you’ve behaved at all properly. There isn’t a prosecutor or a victim advocate in the country who would tolerate that.”
To end the segment, Tapper wanted to make sure he “understood what [Whitehouse] just said.”
“If the Democrats win back the House and/or the Senate, Democrats will investigate what happened, the charges that Professor Ford is laying out, even if that means investigating a Supreme Court justice at the time?” Tapper asked. (RELATED: CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin Says If Kavanaugh Accuser Doesn’t Testify ‘He Is Getting Confirmed’)
“I am confident of that,” said Whitehouse. “And I think we’ll also be investigating why the FBI stood down its background investigation when this came up in this particular background.”