Democrats up the ante in Kavanaugh hearings
Democrats, facing their last day to publicly question Trump’s nominee, upped their ante on Thursday, threatening to release confidential White House emails and accusing Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of lying to senators.
The Judiciary Committee hearing went off the rails almost immediately when Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) sparked a political firestorm by announcing that he was going to release “confidential” documents from Kavanaugh’s time as a White House lawyer.
Several Democrats then used a batch of emails publicly released on Thursday to imply that Kavanaugh had lied to the Judiciary Committee.
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) at one point told Kavanaugh of his testimony, “Judge, I was born at night but not last night.”
The contentious third day of Kavanaugh's hearings before the Judiciary committee began with Booker announcing early on that he would be “knowingly violating the rules" in order to "release the email about racial profiling, and I understand the penalty comes with potential ousting from the Senate."
The White House 2020 contender was quickly backed in releasing email by his colleagues, who released or threatened to release additional emails that had been marked "committee confidential."
Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) tweeted out two pages that had the “committee confidential” stamp.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) — characterizing Democrats as attending the hearing “under protest” — warned he could release private documents before Kavanaugh’s floor vote later this month.
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/405419-democrats-up-the-ante-in-kavanaugh-hearings
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