Friday, September 21, 2018
East Oregonian
Under right terms, Kavanaugh
accuser may testify after all
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By ALAN FRAM
and LISA MASCARO
Associated Press
WASHINGTON
—
Christine Blasey Ford may
testify against Supreme
Court nominee Brett Kava-
naugh after all, her attorney
said Thursday, breathing
new life into the prospect
of a dramatic Senate show-
down next week over Ford’s
accusation that he assaulted
her when both were in high
school.
The preference would
be for Ford to testify next
Thursday, and she doesn’t
want Kavanaugh in the
same room, her attorney
told Judiciary Commit-
tee staff in a 30-minute call
that also touched on security
concerns and others issues,
according to a Senate aide
who wasn’t authorized to
discuss the matter and spoke
on condition of anonymity.
Ford is willing to tell her
story to the Judiciary Com-
mittee, whose senators will
vote on Kavanaugh’s con-
firmation — but only if
agreement can be reached
on “terms that are fair and
which ensure her safety,”
the attorney said in an email
earlier Thursday. In the call,
she said Ford needs time to
secure her family, prepare
her testimony and travel to
Washington. No decisions
were reached, the aide said.
The discussion revived
the possibility that the panel
would hold an electrify-
ing campaign-season hear-
ing at which both Ford and
President Donald Trump’s
Supreme Court nominee
could give their versions
of what did or didn’t hap-
pen at a party in the 1980s.
Kavanaugh, now a judge
on the powerful U.S. Court
of Appeals for the Dis-
trict of Columbia Circuit,
has repeatedly denied her
allegation.
The accusation has jarred
the 53-year-old conservative
jurist’s prospects for win-
ning confirmation, which
until Ford’s emergence last
week had seemed all but cer-
tain. It has also bloomed into
a broader clash over whether
women alleging abuse are
taken seriously by men and
how both political parties
address such claims with
the advent of the #MeToo
AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite
Protesters opposed to President Donald Trump’s Su-
preme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, demonstrate
in the Hart Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill in
Washington on Thursday.
movement — a theme that
could echo in this Novem-
ber’s elections for control of
Congress.
Judiciary
Chairman
Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa,
has scheduled a hearing for
Monday morning, and he
and Senate Majority Leader
Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.,
have indicated it would be
Ford’s only chance to make
her case. Republicans are
anxious to move ahead to
a vote by the committee,
where they hold an 11-10
majority, and then by the full
Senate, which they control,
51-49.
Taylor Foy, spokes-
man for Republicans on the
panel, said after the call that
Grassley “will consult with
his colleagues on the com-
mittee. He remains commit-
ted to providing a fair forum
for both Dr. Ford and Judge
Kavanaugh.”
Attorney Debra Katz said
anew that Ford, 51, a psy-
chology professor in Cali-
fornia, has received death
threats and for safety reasons
has relocated her family.
“She wishes to testify,
provided that we can agree
on terms that are fair and
which ensure her safety,”
Katz wrote in the email,
which was obtained by The
Associated Press after first
being reported by The New
York Times.
In the call later Thurs-
day, Katz asked the commit-
tee to subpoena Mark Judge,
whom Ford has named as
the other teen in the room at
the time. Judge has told the
committee he does not recall
the incident and does not
want to speak publicly.
Should Ford testify, espe-
cially in public, it would
pit the words of two dis-
tinguished
professionals
against each other as televi-
sion close-ups capture every
emotion. Assessing them
would be not just the com-
mittee’s 21 senators —only
four of whom are women,
all Democrats — but also
millions of viewing voters.
Underscoring the sensi-
tivity of all-male GOP sena-
tors grilling a woman who’s
alleged abuse, Republicans
are considering reaching
out to female attorneys who
might question Ford, accord-
ing to a person familiar with
the situation but who wasn’t
authorized to discuss it pub-
licly and spoke on condition
of anonymity.
If Ford opts not to partici-
pate, Republicans could well
dispense with the hearing to
avoid giving Democrats a
forum for peppering Kava-
naugh with embarrassing
questions. They would argue
that they’d offered Ford sev-
eral options for describ-
ing her accusation, but that
she’d snubbed them.
Kavanaugh, who’s been
eager to testify, said he was
ready to appear Monday.
“I will be there,” he wrote
Grassley in a letter. “I con-
tinue to want a hearing as
soon as possible, so that I
can clear my name.”
Ford has contended that
at a house party in Wash-
ington’s Maryland suburbs,
a drunken Kavanaugh tried
undressing her and stifling
her cries on a bed before she
fled.
BRIEFLY
Stocks at records; Dow beats
all-time high from January
Wall Street delivered another set of
milestones Thursday as a wave of buying
sent U.S. stocks solidly higher, driving
the Dow Jones Industrial Average above
the all-time high it closed at in January.
The S&P 500, the benchmark for many
index funds, also hit a new high, eclipsing
the peak it reached last month.
Technology stocks, banks and health
care companies accounted for much of the
broad rally. Energy companies declined
along with crude oil prices.
A weaker dollar, which helps U.S.
exporters, and a mix of mostly encourag-
ing economic reports helped put investors
in a buying mood, a turnaround from ear-
lier in the week when the U.S. and China
each announced a new round of tariffs on
each other’s goods, triggering a sell-off.
“Some of the economic data that came
out today continued to show strength,”
said Lindsey Bell, an investment strat-
egist with CFRA. “Given the strength
in the economy, backed by the stimulus
from tax reform as well as just fiscal stim-
ulus in general, that should be able to off-
set some of the impact that we’re going to
get from tariffs as we go into the end of
the year.”
Four dead, including suspect,
after Maryland shooting
ABERDEEN, Md. (AP) — A woman
working a temporary job at a drugstore
warehouse in Maryland got into an argument
at work Thursday morning and began shoot-
ing colleagues, killing three before fatally
turning the gun on herself, authorities and
witnesses said.
Workers at the Rite Aide distribution cen-
ter in northeastern Maryland described terri-
fying moments of “crazy” gunfire and peo-
ple screaming and running in all directions
after the shooting. Others said they helped
the wounded, one person tying blood-soaked
jeans around a man’s injured leg in a bid to
stop the bleeding.
Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler
said at a news conference that the woman
was later identified as a temporary employee
of the distribution center, Snochia Moseley
of Baltimore County.
“She had reported for her workday as
usual, and around 9 a.m. the shooting began,
striking victims both outside the business
and inside the facility,” Gahler said. “We do
not at this time have a motive for this sense-
less crime.”
Krystal Watson, 33, said her husband,
Eric, works at the facility and told her that
the suspect had been arguing with some-
body else near a time clock after a “town
hall meeting.”
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Florence-weary South
Carolina could get more
record flooding
WILMINGTON, N.C. (AP) — As riv-
ers swollen to record levels started to recede
Thursday in North Carolina, officials tried
to head off potential environmental disas-
ters and prepared for more record flooding
downstream in South Carolina.
Roads were still clogged with people try-
ing to make it back to where the floods had
creeped back, leaving silty mud on walls
and floors. Crews closed some bridges and
reopened others as trillions of gallons of
water continued its long, meandering jour-
ney to the Atlantic Ocean.
Potential
environmental
problems
remained. Duke Energy issued a high-level
emergency alert after floodwaters from the
Cape Fear River overtopped an earthen dike
and inundated a large lake at a closed power
plant near Wilmington, North Carolina. The
utility said it did not think any coal ash was
at risk.
State-owned utility Santee Cooper in
South Carolina is placing an inflatable dam
around a coal ash pond near Conway, saying
the extra 2.5 feet should be enough to keep
floodwaters out. Officials warned human,
hog and other animal waste were mixing in
with floodwaters in the Carolinas.
South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster
estimated damage from the flood in his state
at $1.2 billion in a letter that says the flood-
ing will be the worst disaster in the state’s
modern history. McMaster asked Congres-
sional leaders to hurry federal aid.
Questions? Contact angie.treadwell@oregonstate.edu