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When Brett Kavanaugh cleared his Senate confirmation hearing, the crutch leaned upon by many of his supporters was “well, the FBI looked into all this.” Hearing Dr. Ford’s measured but powerful testimony and Kavanaugh’s wildly unhinged retort made for a pretty strong case that this guy wasn’t cut out for the top plum in the legal world. Getting past that brutal day of testimony required GOP senators to come up with a clever workaround to get exactly what they wanted all along without having to take responsibility for putting a sneering, defensive jerk on the bench.
Enter the FBI, which was charged with conducting a background check to give senators a talking point to wave around when they asked America to forget everything it had just watched. The FBI would chase down all these leads and let everyone know that ol’ Brett was a boy scout.
Even at the time, the FBI’s investigation seemed shoddy and superficial. But as months have dragged on, a couple of senators have kept checking up on the FBI with law firms representing witnesses in the matter and have compiled enough evidence to write a letter to FBI Director Chris Wray asking, “Um, what the hell were you guys doing here?”
Senators Sheldon Whitehouse and Chris Coons sent a letter yesterday asking Wray to explain the investigative steps taken by the FBI throughout the course of the background check that was touted as a key reason to put a guy on the Supreme Court.
Every question reads as a “hey, we’re just looking for some help here,” but for lawyers capable of reading between the lines, every request carries with it the implied threat that “we already know you didn’t do the thing we’re about to ask.” The letter points to information garnered from other materials — including a letter from the firm of KaiserDillon, who longtime readers might remember as former Above the Law columnists — and it’s clear the senators have stockpiled more where that came from.
Impeaching a Supreme Court justice at this point in time would be just as fruitless as impeaching a president, but unlike a president, Kavanaugh will still be on the Court when the makeup of the Senate shifts again. It seems Whitehouse and Coons want to keep doing their due diligence for when that day might come.
(Read the whole letter on the next page.)
Joe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.