GOP senator: Kavanaugh's 'a good man' even if he tried to rape a girl

Even some Republicans have acknowledged that the accusation Brett Kavanaugh tried to rape a girl in high school is a “serious” one that should delay Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court.

But Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch is not among them.

Christine Blasey Ford told the Washington Post that when they were both teenagers, Kavanaugh held her down and covered her mouth to silence her screams as he assaulted her. According to Hatch, who has only spoken with Kavanaugh, Ford is “mistaken.”

But Hatch also said that even if she’s not mistaken — even if she really was sexually assaulted by Kavanaugh — it doesn’t matter.

“If that was true, I think it would be hard for senators to not consider who the judge is today,” Hatch said Monday. “That’s the issue. Is this judge a really good man? And he is. And by any measure he is.”

In other words, being an attempted rapist is not disqualifying. It’s not even relevant. Kavanaugh, according to Hatch, is a good man even if he is also a violent criminal who forever traumatized a teenage girl.

Republicans have gone to absurd lengths to dismiss the credible and serious allegation against Kavanaugh. On Friday, before Ford revealed her identity, Hatch dismissed her claims because she had refused to speak publicly. He, along with other Senate Republicans, insisted that Ford’s story was an “11th hour accusation” from Democrats.

He said that “every accuser deserves to be heard.” But now that Ford has been forced to go public with her story, Hatch is willfully sticking his fingers in his ears and saying he doesn’t want to hear anything at all.

Kavanaugh is a “good man,” according to Hatch — and nothing, not even a violent sexual crime, will persuade him otherwise. So Ford is both a liar whose story he doesn’t believe, and at the same time, potentially a sexual assault victim whose story doesn’t matter.

Hatch’s dismissal of both the story and the underlying crime is eerily familiar. It’s exactly how Hatch treated Anita Hill for saying then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas had sexually harassed her — not just during the confirmation hearings in 1991, but even decades later.

In 2010, Hatch was still insisting that Thomas had told the truth and that he deserved an apology. And Hatch was still smearing Hill, saying she “talked herself into believing what she said” during Thomas’ hearing.

Like his statements about Ford now, he suggested Hill was mistaken and confused and “outed by the feminist women at that time.”

Now Hatch is resorting to the same ugly playbook of attacking the victim, and at the same time, saying he doesn’t care what the truth is.

Hatch wants Kavanaugh appointed to the Supreme Court, and nothing — not even a violent attempted rape — will change his mind.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.