Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., emerged from Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday feeling “really upset” toward his political opponents.
The South Carolina senator, an ally of President Donald Trump‘s, excoriated Democrats for “playing a political game” after the first round of the hearing, in which Ford, 51, testified that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, 53, had sexually assaulted her decades earlier.
“I’m really upset that they knew about this in August and never told anybody,” Graham told reporters outside the hearing room. “I’m really upset that [Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif.] believed this was a credible allegation, [and] that you wouldn’t do Mr. Judge Kavanaugh the service of saying, ‘I’ve got this, what’s your side of the story.'”
Ford sent a letter to California Democratic Rep. Anna Eshoo detailing her allegation that Kavanaugh, as a teenager in the early 1980s, had pinned her to a bed and tried to rip her clothes off while drunk at a small party. Ford had requested confidentiality in the letter.
The letter was obtained by Feinstein, the Judiciary Committee’s ranking member, in late July, but was not revealed to the public until mid-September. By that time, Kavanaugh had already completed public hearings and attended dozens of one-on-one meetings with senators — including Feinstein.
Kavanaugh denied Ford’s allegation, as well as allegations of sexual misconduct from two other women who came forward in September. His testimony was scheduled to follow Ford’s on Thursday.
“I feel ambushed as the majority,” Graham told the reporters after Ford testified. He suggested that Democrats were attempting to push Kavanaugh’s nomination beyond the November midterm elections, where they have a chance of taking the majority away from the GOP.
“I’m not going to reward people for playing a political game,” Graham said.
Ford was a “nice lady, who has come forward to tell a story that’s uncorroborated,” Graham said. But, he added, if “this is enough, God help anybody else that gets nominated.”
