in 1968, the republicans filibustered linden johnson s nominee for chief justice of the united states, abe fortis. in october 1968, so roughly the same period of time as now. sorry to interrupt you. an investigation would take maybe three days. we re not talking about a huge delay here. the reality is that any change in the midterm elections, that s not going to have any impact until the new year. so bread kavanagh denies this ever happening, right? and says it s a smear campaign against him. he says he looks forward to testifying thursday and defending his good name. but wouldn t an investigation help him do just that rather than this effort to rush the confirmation hearing through as quickly as possible and leave the impression that all of these allegations sort of left hanging basically and essentially a stain against brett kavanagh? it s in his interest. well, if we think of another historical parallel in 1991,
ago did not happen. the people who knew me then know that this did not happen and have said so. this is a smear, plain and simple. i look forward to testifying on thursday about the truth and defending my good name and the reputation for character and integrity i have spent a lifetime building against these last-minute allegations. white house spokeswoman kerry kupek said this 35-year-old uncorroborated claim is the latest in a coordinated smear campaign by the democrats designed to tear down a good man. this claim denied by all who were said to be present and is wholly inconsistent with what many women and men who knew judge kavanagh at the time in college say. the white house stands firmly behind judge kavanagh. ramirez was initially hesitant to speak publicly because she said her memory contained gaps because she had been drinking at the time. after she reassessed her memory over the course of six days with her attorney, she did go on record with the new yorker.
that the person who is going to be confirmed for the highest court in the land has the integrity that is required of a justice of a court of that standing. just very quickly, before this second allegation went public, we also learned the mock questioning with kavanagh in preparation for his own testimony thursday was not going well because he was refusing to answer some questions that he found too personal. how problematic could that prove to be on thursday when he will have to answer some of those questions? well, it may or may not actually change any minds in the united states senate. but it certainly has repercussions in the court of public opinion more broadly. again, i think in 1991, some of those democratic senators were very uncomfortable with the way that they questioned anita hill and in the end, you had in the following spring anna dixon, an incumbent senator from illinois who actually lost his primary, a
allegations against kavanagh, could these new allegations potentially be a game changer and force the committee to hit the pause button and investigate these allegations? well, the committee really can t afford any more delays. the senate goes out of session for the elections on the 26th of october. and really, between now and then, if the senate needed to have further questioning and scrutiny that had to go through the committee and then on to the senate floor, and really we could get to a point where we get up to the elections without a final vote on the senate floor of the nominee, i suspect that s what the democrats might be hoping happens, that they delay this sufficiently that then the elections happen, and then they maybe make it politically impossible for a new nominee to get through in the lame duck session. there s been precedent for this.
black woman became the first african-american woman elected to the united states senate. so even if kavanagh doesn t, you know, maybe votes don t change in the way that kavanagh answers the questions this week, but it could change minds when people go to the ballot box in november and democrats might be they might lose the vote, but they might claim the electoral victory in a few weeks time. right. the aim of all of this is to get to the truth of the matter, isn t it, to determine what we re dealing with here and who is telling the truth. we will see. richard johnson, thank you so much for joining us. i appreciate it. thank you. well, the u.s. and china are raising the stakes of global trade and millions of consumers could soon feel the pinch. the u.s. officially slammed china with new tariffs on monday. they cover $200 billion of electronics and furniture. china is retaliating. just after the u.s. imposed their tariffs, beijing responded with a tax on $60 billion of