Trump Unleashes on Kavanaugh Accuser as Key Republican Wavers
In lashing out on Tuesday, Mr. Trump dispensed with the restraint that advisers have urged him to exercise and adopted the attack mode he prefers. He portrayed the allegations against Judge Kavanaugh as character assassination, and he went further than before in directly challenging the credibility of Ms. Ramirez.
“She said she was totally inebriated and she was all messed up and she doesn’t know it was him but it might have been him,” Mr. Trump said while in New York for the annual session of the United Nations General Assembly. Then, speaking sarcastically, he added, “Oh, gee, let’s not make him a Supreme Court judge because of that.”
As the president of Colombia looked on, Mr. Trump accused the Democrats of smearing Judge Kavanaugh. “I think it’s horrible what the Democrats have done. It’s a con game they’re playing; they’re really con artists,” he said. “They’re playing a con game,” he continued, “and they play it very well. They play it actually much better than the Republicans.”
He went on to call it a con game several more times, even at one point spelling it out, “C-O-N.”
Democrats argued that Mr. Trump and other Republicans were casting a verdict without actually hearing from any accusers. “Senate Republicans promised that ‘anyone who comes forward as Dr. Ford has deserves to be heard,’” Senate Democrats said in a statement. “Unfortunately, it appears that Republican leaders have prejudged the outcome of Thursday’s hearing.”
For many Republicans, the charges and countercharges have only cemented their view that Judge Kavanaugh is being smeared by a coordinated campaign of Democrats and liberal activists.
Senator Bob Corker, Republican of Tennessee, said he was not persuaded by Ms. Ramirez’s story. “I read The New Yorker article. It’s pretty thin. No one else remembered any of it,” he said. “This is really getting kind of carried away, it’s feeling more like a circus. But again, I did feel like this first accuser should be heard.”