Senator blasts Susan Collins for 'insulting' Dr. Christine Blasey Ford

Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) tried to claim on Sunday that she believed Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony about being sexually assaulted — but also that she didn’t actually believe Ford when she said she was assaulted by Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

And Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI) wasn’t having any of Collins’ nonsense.

“I believe that [Dr. Ford] believes what she testified to. … I do not believe that Brett Kavanaugh was her assailant,” Collins said on Sunday morning’s edition of CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Moments later, host Dana Bash asked Hirono about Collins’ remarks.

“You heard Senator Susan Collins, your colleague, say that she doesn’t believe that Justice Kavanaugh assaulted Ford,” Bash said. “What’s your reaction?”

“She said that … Dr. Ford thinks that she was assaulted, which is even more insulting than saying that she gave a very credible account,” Hirono said.

“I certainly believe Dr. Ford,” Hirono added, pointing out that Ford testified to being “100 percent sure” it was Kavanaugh who assaulted her.

“You think that Senator Collins is insulting to Professor Ford?” Bash asked.

“Well, to say that she thinks that Dr. Ford ‘thinks’ that she was assaulted — what is that? Is she mistaken?” Hirono said. “All of us [senators] have been hearing stories of and accounts from survivors going back many, many years, where they kept all these painful, traumatic accounts to themselves. And this is what happens with sexual assault survivors.”

Hirono also pointed out that, contrary to what Collins and others say, there was plenty of corroboration for Ford’s testimony.

Ford told others about the assault before Kavanaugh was nominated — which is corroborated by two sets of therapists’ notes, and by friends who say they remember talking to her about it. Ford also passed a polygraph test.

Even Kavanaugh’s own calendar entries from high school were consistent with details in her account, including the names of boys who were Kavanaugh’s regular drinking buddies.

Meanwhile, there is ample evidence that Kavanaugh lied about his heavy drinking and his attitudes toward his female classmates.

Dozens of witnesses could have corroborated elements of Ford’s testimony — but they were ignored by a sham FBI investigation that was artificially limited by Senate Republicans and the White House.

Susan Collins spent 44 minutes stabbing women in the back during her speech supporting Kavanaugh, and now she’s twisting the knife with her insulting remarks about Ford.

Americans won’t forget that.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.