decency and courage than every democrat member of the committee combined. god bless him. short time after graham s comments, senator orrin hatch of utah echoed some of brett kavanagh s testimony. this is a national disgrace the way you re being treated. and in the middle of it all we have judge kavanagh, a man who until two weeks ago, was a pillar of the legal community. there s been no whisper of misconduct by him in the time he s been a judge. what we have are uncorroborated, unsubstantiated claims from his teenage years. after today s hearing, republican senator bob corker of tennessee announced as we said he would be voting for kavanagh. there are several other important votes we don t yet know about. as we mentioned, senators flake, murkowski, collins, joe manchin met in private tonight after the hearing, after their meeting flake told reporters he is facing a tough choice.
senator corker one of the possible swing votes, republican retiring said he would support kavanagh. it seems to be moving toward kavanagh, but a lot of votes still in the air. we hear this reporting, bob, those on the fence, the collins, murkowski, flake may vote. in both the democratic party and the republican party, all of the senators, the red state senators, moderate republicans, that group within the chamber, they are really looking to each other. no one really wants to be out there as the isolated person taking a political stand that s very dramatic, perhaps lone vote in a way that breaks away from your party. so they re looking to each other. a lot of back channel discussions tonight where are people really going to go. taking a political stand. imagine that. cynthia oxney, as dispassionately as you can, how
revealing. it was revealing about the republican party. what a split screen. senator graham versus senator flake. senator graham just like judge kavanagh, taking the advice of president trump, following the model of president trump, defiant, fight, total political war in this charged america that we re all living through and covering. and then there s retiring republican jeff flake of arizona, reluctant to embrace that kind of turn in the republican party, that kind of war mentality when it comes to american politics, unsure of how he s going to vote. it s just a split republican party in how they re coming down on this. for now it s that graham/trump approach, that aggression that s fueling senators inside the gop. when i m talking to them in the hallways and they re mulling what to do. cynthia, back to something, a point you started before the break, to find for judge kavanagh, does that have to mean you believe she is crazy, mistaken, or lying? yeah, absolutely.
important votes we don t yet know about. as we mentioned, senators flake, murkowski, collins, joe manchin met in private tonight after the hearing, after their meeting flake told reporters he is facing a tough choice. it s a close call. you leave with doubts whichever way. that s the nature of this. there s no way you can leave certain you re completely right, he s right, she s wrong, she s right, he s wrong. i mean, you re never certain. you just do the best we can. that s what we re trying to do. back with us, robert costa, cynthia oxney, mimi rocca, steve schmidt. robert, not since the heart injection and pulp fiction have i seen someone spring to life the way senator graham did today. it was right after dick durbin, you ll forgive the phrase, drew blood on the subject of the fbi.
the testimony compelling. he thought kavanagh, the federal judge needed to come through with his testimony. he urged kavanagh in a phone call to make sure he was defiant in his testimony and by end of day the president decided to stand by the nominee and thought he did a strong job in his testimony and really pushing back against the democrats. but it s still tbd in the u.s. not. where are senator collins, senator murkowski, they have decisions to make. senator corker one of the possible swing votes, republican retiring said he would support kavanagh. it seems to be moving toward kavanagh, but a lot of votes still in the air. we hear this reporting, bob, those on the fence, the collins, murkowski, flake may vote. in both the democratic party and the republican party, all of the senators, the red state