Watching Rachel Maddow’s opening segment I was struck by her point that Dr. Ford has formally requested (through her lawyer) that the FBI investigate her claim. That of course includes them taking a formal statement(s) from her which puts her in legal jeopardy if she lies to them. At the same time the GOP is twisting and writhing like a bag of angry snakes to avoid getting the FBI involved in this matter. Their excuses are beyond ridiculous. That they are also staggeringly hypocritical is not surprise — it’s part of their DNA these days.
Kavanaugh and the GOP are cowards. They are afraid of having people perfectly willing to make public statements sit down and formally go on the record and risk real, significant legal trouble to lie for Brett Kavanaugh. Sure, some of the bigwigs will but folks he knew back in high school who aren’t powerful people? I don’t think so. And from what I see neither does Kavanaugh, his buddy McGahan, Trump or any of the GOP that knows all that’s gone on.
Oh, and before I forget I think we now know how this whole story leaked, and how the GOP was prepared with it’s “65 women who knew Brett Kavanaugh in high school” letter ready to drop if needed. That’s probably a subject for another diary.
As for my topic that prompted this, we all know the farce that’s been under way. The rush to get the “hearing” out of the way and rush through a confirmation vote is genuine but also a cover. Don’t kid yourself. If the FBI starts looking into this it’s going to take more than a week. Probably several weeks is more likely. The GOP could still (in theory) confirm Kavanaugh before the midterms, but if he’s not on SCOTUS at the beginning of the term they might have to delay some important cases coming up this fall — maybe until next year. If they are going to engage in a rash of conservative judicial activism they need to do it this fall. However their biggest worry is that they feel it’s likely enough would be uncovered by an FBI investigation of Dr. Ford’s allegation that Kavanaugh would be toast. They look bad now, but they will look even worse when everything shakes out.
The attempted rape of Dr. Ford (and I believe her) was a state crime. The FBI has no jurisdiction and I’m not sure even an invitation by the Montgomery County (MD) DA’s Office for assistance would enable them to get involved. Due to technicalities with the MOU under which the FBI does background investigations for an administration once they’ve handed in a report they are done. They can’t reopen it unless asked to by the WH or other requesting agency. And the entire GOP from the WH on down is dead set against asking the FBI to reopen Kavanaugh’s background investigation.
OTOH the FBI doesn’t need anyone’s permission to open an investigation when a crime crosses state lines. Sending threats and especially death threats via snail mail, through email or social media across state lines is a crime. So is hacking email and other social media. All of these are all federal crimes. And once Senator Grassley called a hearing including setting a date and issued an invitation to Dr. Ford to testify she became a witness in a federal proceeding. Senator Hirano appeared during the first segment of Maddow’s show and called it witness tampering. Even if the death threats started before the hearing was called and Dr. Ford was invited I would bet everything I own (admittedly not much) that they have continued.
So, we have hacking of social media accounts. We have threats communicated electronically. We have those threats (almost certainly) continuing as Dr. Ford has been called on to be a witness in a formal federal proceeding.
How is any of that NOT FBI jurisdiction? IANAL but if I’m wrong we have lawyers including prosecutors with federal experience in the Kos ranks so they will tell me if I’m full of crap on this. But if I’m correct we need to be hounding our Senators (both mine are GOP and Tillis is on Judiciary) but more importantly journalists — every reporter should be asking Chris Wray why cant the FBI can’t open an investigation?
Once open, it wouldn’t take much to steer it towards collecting information on who made the threats and whether they have any connection to Kavanaugh and others in the GOP. IOW it shouldn't take much for such an investigation to morph into what should be happening as I write this.
I might be way off base in having written this. It’s kind of been dashed off while trying to follow other stuff on MSNBC. So this isn’t as well thought out as I’d like it to be. But I wanted to get the thought/question out there as quick as I could. Because if folks chew on it and think I’m on to something we need to be pushing it (with calls and emails both to politicians and journalists) right away. If not tonight then starting first thing in the morning.