merits? perhaps. there s a transactional aspect of this relationship too. after lindsey graham was fired up as he was during those confirmation hearings. as kavanaugh joins the court, republican senator susan collins is being pressed on why she trusted kavanaugh of his accuser in casting her deciding vote. take a listen to that. i do not believe that brett ca kavanaugh was her assailant. i do believe she was assaulted. i don t know by whom. i m not certain when. i do not believe that he was the all right. i want to bring in betsy woodrougwoo woodroof. all three guests are msnbc contributors. welcome. a winning week for the president s base. they claim the voters are
shifted is predicated on a sense of relief that professor ford will not testify in public. but if you go back 48 hours ago when this was in question, that was the thing everyone was afraid of, that she would tell her story and minds would be changed and senators like susan collins and jeff flake and others might not support judge ca kavanaugh. how did the white house stumble into the situation they are in now? i think it is fair to say is it wasn t some strategic plan they happened on sunday morning, its of really profession or ford s reluctance in the wake of death threats and other factors in her life that has them sort of back on top of this. right. i think the one piece of strategy was to keep the president in check. if he had come out there on monday and tuesday and railed against dr. ford and with full throat defense his nominee, but attacked his accuse erk i think
drunken high school daze in wasted, tales of a gen x drunk noimpt i heard he puked in someone s car the other night. yeah, he passed out on his way back from a party. meanwhile, blaise ford s attorney alleges sexual assault. she believes that but for his inebriation and his inability to take her clothes off he would have raped her. reporter: the accuser s attorney said she struggled whether to come forward and finally talked to the washington post after her identity became known through press reports. we are expecting to hear from cavanaugh s accuser at a public hearing monday. the senate judiciary committee will hear testimony from both christine blaise ford and judge ca kavanaugh at a 10:00 a.m. hearing. i m joined now by joan bescobic. she is a cnn supreme court analyst. so good to have you with us. thank you. so, joan, as a journalist,
sparks set to fly as president trump s supreme court pick, judge brett kavanaugh, kicks off his senate confirmation hearings tomorrow. democrats and republicans preparing for a contentious battle. what are lawmakers telling you? as you can imagine, most lawmakers put this on the back burner for a few days as they focused on paying their respects to senator john mccain. i did speak with senator feinstein, the top democrat on the senate judiciary committee, as well as senator durbin. they talk about the lack of documents coming their way. ca kavanaugh has an extensive legal record having issued more than 300 opinions. he is an open book in that area. the democrats are complaining that the republican colleagues on the same committee are handicapping their ability to