Senate GOP Hires Woman to Question Ford, Kavanaugh

Blasey Ford asked in response.

Mitchell said she had been drawn to prosecuting sex crimes after a stint working as a law clerk for an attorney on a case involving a youth choir director.

Instead, Rachel Mitchell, a female prosecutor from Arizona whose “life mission” has been to investigate sex crimes, is interviewing Ford on behalf of the Republican party.

“This is not a criminal case”. She corrected that account to say that Smyth was not in the room at the time of the alleged misconduct. “As a former prosecutor, I can’t imagine what I would be asking about when I have no investigative material on which to rely”.

Cornyn (R-Texas), a member of the committee, said the body could vote on forwarding Kavanaugh’s nomination to the full Senate soon after they hear from the judge’s accuser, Prof.

The tenor of the questions suggested that Mitchell was trying, if gently, to question the reliability of Ford’s recollections and portray Ford as a pawn of Democrats who are out to stop Kavanaugh at any cost.

Ford replied that she contacted her representative in Congress, Rep. Anna Eshoo, a Democrat, and that Eshoo recommended contacting Feinstein, a California senator and the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee.

Trump fired at Kavanaugh’s accusers at the United Nations on Tuesday, saying Ramirez “has nothing” and was “totally inebriated and all messed up” at a Yale party decades ago where she claims Kavanaugh exposed himself.

‘I look forward eagerly to hearing from both Dr. Ford and Judge Kavanaugh under oath this Thursday morning.

The take from the liberal media was swift: “Rachel Mitchell’s Interrogation of Christine Blasey Ford Quickly Devolved Into an Embarrassment”, wrote Slate. Mitchell now serves as Maricopa county’s deputy county attorney and chief of the special victims division, which handles sex crimes and family violence. Democratic senators on the committee plan to quiz Ford and Kavanaugh – who will also testify on Friday – themselves.

Bromwich pointed out there is no precedent for the use of an outside counsel “for the sole goal of shielding the members” from asking a witness questions when they are testifying before the committee.

Others HuffPost spoke to had a less charitable explanation for his decision.

“[A senator] will do something that you guys will run 24/7, and inadvertently somebody will do something that’s insensitive”, he told reporters Monday.

Her work has earned her numerous awards in her state, including in 2003 when she was recognized as the “Outstanding Arizona Sexual Assault Prosecutor of the Year” by her state’s governor and attorney general.

Mitchell’s compassion for sexual assault victims makes her an ironic choice to present questions from the GOP.

She also was among the prosecutors who examined some of the hundreds of sex-crime cases botched by then-Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s office over a three-year period ending in 2007 to determine whether any could be salvaged and taken to court. Kavanaugh has sat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit since 2006. She handled almost all his immigration cases and the cases involving sex crimes.

Mitchell concluded her interview with questions concerning the proper way to interview trauma victims.

“I’m not sure. I’m not sure how those exchanges went but I did not speak to anyone”, Blasey Ford answered. I’ve worked to give Dr. Ford an opportunity to share serious allegations with committee members in any format she’d like after learning of the allegations.