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Live blog of confirmation hearing | September 4, 2018

We are live-blogging the first day of Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

3rd & 7 37yd

Grassley: The motion is out of order.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:08:26 PM
Booker: Motion to move to executive session so we can consider Blumenthal's motion.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:08:43 PM
A new flurry of protests. "This is a joke," says one demonstrator. Members of the committee of both parties are generally taking the protests in stride.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:08:46 PM
Blumenthal: They are not out of order. Just because the chairman says there are does not make them out of order. I second motion for executive session so we can have motion to adjourn so we can review the documents.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:09:13 PM
Grassley: Motion denied.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:09:20 PM
Booker: Would take ten minutes for us to have this motion and vote.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:09:31 PM
Booker: What is the rush? What are we afraid of in holding a vote?

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:09:46 PM
Sen. Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana: I understand my colleagues. What are going to be the ground rules? Are we allowed to interrupt each other and witness? Should we seek recognition from the chair?

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:10:18 PM
Grassley: Decorum and past practice would be that we wouldn't have all these motions. "You're new to the Senate."

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:10:40 PM
Grassley: Every member gets 10 minutes to make remarks.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:10:53 PM
I don't know if every seat had been filled, but there are about 30-40 empty seats in the audience. That's almost every single one.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:11:54 PM
Grassley: If we have to go Saturday and Sunday, we'll do that.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:12:18 PM
Harris (I think) just tried to say something, but Grassley turned back to Kennedy. He asks if we need to be recognized by chair to speak.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:12:44 PM
Kennedy: Patience is good, Mr. Chairman. You should be recognized.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:13:02 PM
Grassley twice has raised the prospect of going to Saturday and Sunday, which would seem unlikely by normal practice.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:13:20 PM
Sen. Hirono has a question about ground rules. Is majority still requiring us to pre-clear documents and videos the minority would like to use?

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:13:41 PM
Grassley: I'm not prepared to address that because doesn't know how much minority wants to use.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:13:58 PM
Hirono: I don't think we've ever had to pre-clear what we want to ask nominee about. And Klobuchar: How can we if we don't even know what the rules are?

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:14:29 PM
Grassley: We never had a request for video before. It's not about the questions, it's about presentation of something that's never been part of hearing in the past.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:15:01 PM
Sen. Tilis, Republican of North Carolina: He is reading a news report about a planned obstruction request over the holiday weekend.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:15:36 PM
Sen. Durbin: There was a phone conference yesterday. Many issues were raised. One was the documents that had been labeled as "committee confidential." In past, that label would be only for extraordinary circumstances.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:16:11 PM
Durbin: One discussion yesterday was about having hearing without access to basic information about his public record.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:17:00 PM
Durbin: I had no idea during the phone conference that there would be 40,000 more documents.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:17:24 PM
Blumenthal just cited Rule 4.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:17:36 PM
The rule is about motions and votes. Blumenthal: I ask for a vote on my motion to adjourn under Rule 4. These are rules we are obligated to follow. Chairman has no right to override by fiat.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:18:16 PM
Grassley: We follow those rules under executive session.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:18:29 PM
Protestor: Where is the transparency. Don't take away my healthcare. Stop the corruption.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:19:06 PM
Another interruption (and I realize that additional audience members had been let in). I don't know how long the line is outside the room.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:19:10 PM
Yes, some new spectators have entered. Incredibly, U.S. Capitol Police gave those first protestors who stood and shouted a warning and asked them to sit down. Not anymore.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:20:17 PM
Grassley says it's under federal law that the most sensitive documents are kept committee confidential.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:20:19 PM
We've had our first audience interruption from a man, who calls the hearing an attack on women's rights.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:21:24 PM
Grassley said his staff was available to the Democrats.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:21:42 PM
Are they protestors being ejected? Why not?

by Andrea Layne 9/4/2018 2:21:44 PM
Protestor, a man in suit: Senator Grassley, this hearing is an attack on democracy. Shut this hearing down. He puts up a little more physical resistance to being removed than the others and takes three officers to remove him.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:22:15 PM
Leahy: I was chairman when Kagan was here. 99% of her White House record was made public 12 days before hearing.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:23:39 PM
Leahy: Kavanaugh, only 4% made public

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:24:00 PM
A female protestor begins with "Esteemed senators ..." Not all the protestors seems to hold the committee in such high regard.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:24:09 PM
Leahy: I have been in Senate for 19 Supreme Court nominations. What's being done here is unprecedented. What are we hiding?

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:24:24 PM
The only other time we heard a president invoke executive privilege was Rehnquist's hearing, and both Republicans and Democrats objected. Reagan withdrew executive privilege and released the documents. I'm sorry to see the SJC descend this way.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:25:14 PM
Leahy: This is not the SJC I saw when I joined the Senate.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:25:29 PM
That would be Rehnquist's 1986 hearing to ascend from associate justice to chief justice.

by Mark Walsh 9/4/2018 2:26:37 PM
Klobuchar: Few points. 1) Sotomayor never worked in White House. 2) I appreciate that you granted request for campaign finance documents. [She holds them up, they are maybe 30 pages only.]

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:27:54 PM
Klobuchar: I also joined several letter led by Feinstein asking that all committee documents be released to public.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:28:29 PM
Klobuchar asks whether Grassley has another example of executive privilege being invoked to block release of White House documents during a confirmation hearing.

by Edith Roberts 9/4/2018 2:29:32 PM
Sen. Cornin (Republican): This is first hearing I've seen according to mob rule. We have rules in the Senate. Everyone will have a chance to have their say.

by Andrew Hamm 9/4/2018 2:29:36 PM

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Scribble

Live blog of confirmation hearing | September 4, 2018

We are live-blogging the first day of Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Featured Posts

Retired Justice John Paul Stevens has died – Amy Howe

Battle over border wall comes to the court – Amy Howe

Trump administration ends effort to include citizenship question on 2020 census – Amy Howe

Sponsored by Casetext

SCOTUStalk see all

Email Digest Sign-Up

Merits Case Pages and Archives

This Week at the Court

Major Cases

Recent Decisions

Current Relists

Recent Special Features

Statistical Snapshot

Live Blog Archives

Twitter Feed

Majority Opinions by Author

Voting Breakdown Argued Cases

Calendar: July 2019

July 2019

Holiday

Download our App in the Apple Store

Videos see all

Peabody Award

Sigma Delta Chi

National Press Club Award

Silver Gavel Award

American Gavel Award

Webby Award