Kavanaugh Clears First of Two Senate Votes, Final Vote on Saturday

Judge Brett Kavanaugh is just one step from being confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court after the Senate Republicans pushed his confirmation through a tight 51-49 procedural vote on Oct. 5.

By voting to invoke cloture, the floor debate on the confirmation will have a time limit, preventing Democrats to filibuster the final vote expected on Saturday.

Democrats committed themselves to oppose Kavanaugh within minutes after President Donald Trump nominated him. Some Republicans accuse the Democrats of subverting the confirmation process.

More than a month before Kavanaugh appeared before the Senate judiciary committee for his confirmation hearings, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) received a letter from Christine Ford. Ford alleged Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her 36 years ago, when they were both in high school. Feinstein withheld the allegation until after the confirmation hearings. All of the witnesses Ford named failed to corroborate her allegations. A prosecutor who questioned her before the Senate panel concluded that no reasonable prosecutor would bring a case based on Ford’s claims.

Democrats triggered a national spectacle amid the confirmation process, sparking a media frenzy with some outlets breathlessly reporting additional uncorroborated allegations of at least two more women. The tactic appears to have backfired even among the Democratic base, with 40 percent of Democrats polled agreeing with Kavanaugh’s view that the confirmation process has devolved into a “national disgrace,” according to a Rasmussen poll.

Republicans are even more upset about the proceedings, with more than three in four conservatives agreeing with Kavanaugh’s statement.

Still, the GOP-led committee asked the FBI to do another, seventh, background check on the nominee.

Two key Republican senators said on Oct. 4, they were satisfied with the FBI’s background investigation report and said it didn’t corroborate the claims of the women accusing Kavanaugh of misconduct.

The top Democrat in the Senate, Chuck Schumer of New York, said he disagreed that there was no evidence of misconduct. Other Democrats dismissed the investigation as insufficient.

Closed the GOP Gap

The Democrats’ campaign against Kavanaugh appears to have fired up Republican voters, according to an NPR poll. In July, Democrats held a 10-percent edge over Republicans in a poll asking voters if the November elections are “very important.” At the time, 78 percent Democrats said the elections were “very important.”

That edge shrunk to just two points in the same poll conducted in October amid the drama surrounding the Kavanaugh confirmation. Among Democrats, 82 percent said the elections are “very important,” compared to 80 percent of Republicans.

Beyond the midterms, Kavanaugh, if confirmed, would shift the nation’s top court to a solid conservative majority. Now-retired Justice Anthony Kennedy, whose seat Kavanaugh was nominated to fill, sometimes sided with liberal justices on certain crucial issues, including abortion and same-sex marriage.

Trump’s prior Supreme Court nominee, Justice Neil Gorsuch, filled the seat of a solid conservative, the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

Trump campaigned on a promise to nominate conservative Supreme Court justices and has said the promise was a large reason why he was elected.

Epoch Times staff member Ivan Pentchoukov and Reuters contributed to this report.