*Trigger Warning for Sexual Assault*
Since I wrote about Brett Kavanaugh two weeks ago, too much has happened. I figured I would do an update on the voting and his confirmation hearing but here’s another article about a man who sexually assaulted women about 30 years ago and it is just now coming out. While at first, it was only one woman coming forward, there is now another woman who says she was also sexually assaulted by Brett Kavanaugh. This story originally came out on September 16 and has since grown from one woman to two.
Christine Blasey Ford, a professor of psychology at Palo Alto University in California, was the first woman to say something. She recalls a house party during her high school years in the early 1980’s where Kavanaugh pinned her to the bed and attempted to remove her clothes. At this point, he was covering her mouth to muffle her screams. Kavanaugh denies these allegations but Ford has been backed by her husband who learned about these events during couples therapy in 2012. There are notes from the therapist about the incident according to Ford. This allegation came to light when she sent in a tip to the Washington Post about the assault. Since then, she has taken a polygraph test in which she was found to be telling the truth about the incident.
The second woman is Deborah Ramirez who attended Yale with Kavanaugh during the 1983-1984 school year. She now lives in Colorado and works as a board member and volunteers at Safehouse Progressive Alliance for Nonviolence which is an organization that helps victims of domestic violence. She says that her experience with Kavanaugh was during a house party at Yale where he exposed himself to her. In the process, he got extremely close to Ramirez who tried to push him away, touching him in the process. Raised as a devout Catholic, this was a traumatic experience for her and was embarrassed about the events of the party. She was originally hesitant to say anything because at the party she has been drinking so she was worried about gaps in her memory. She is now calling on the FBI to investigate the incident
So what does this mean for Brett Kavanaugh?
Kavanaugh was 17 at the time of Ford’s accusations and 18 during Ramirez’s experience. During the first week of his hearings, Kavanaugh swore, under oath, that as a legal adult he had never “committed any verbal or physical harassment or assault of a sexual nature.” If they find him guilty of any count of sexual assault, it would also be considered lying under oath since, at the time of Ramirez, he was a legal adult. Ford intends to take the stand against Brett Kavanaugh on Thursday, September 27 and his hearing was requested to be postponed until further notice by Democrats. Kavanaugh will also take the stand in order to defend himself against the allegations.