Intentional negligence from New York Times ignites further attacks on Justice Kavanaugh
Photograph contributed by Flickr
Brett Kavanaugh’s swearing-in ceremony with the presence of Donald Trump on Oct. 8, 2018.
Assuming his position of Associate Justice on the Supreme Court on Oct. 8, 2018, one would think Brett Kavanaugh would begin to fade from the spotlight as the FBI’s investigation into claims of sexual misconduct came to a close.
Facing an excruciating investigation into allegations of sexual assault from Christine Blasey Ford, despite no evidence and contradicting testimonies, Kavanaugh’s reputation as a respectible member of the justice community began to face intense scrutiny.
A focal point of the recent book published by New York Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly, “The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation,” was that a second individual came forward with allegations of sexual misconduct, Deborah Ramirez.
Ramirez stated her allegations to Ronan Farrow from the New Yorker, however later on called former classmates to “back up her claims.” Ramirez stated she could not be certain Kavanaugh was the student responsible.
Furthermore, The New Yorker interviewed several Yale students of Kavanaugh and Ramirez’s class but could not find a single witness to Ramirez’s claims.
If these baseless allegations weren’t enough to totally smear Kavanaugh’s lifetime admirable and humble reputation, a third allegation has been pressed on the justice.
Taken up by former Stormy Daniels attorney, Michael Avenatti, the attorney’s client Julie Swetnick claims she saw Kavanaugh and other boys participate in sexual misconduct and assault at parties while he was in high school.
Swetnick could not provide any witnesses to the allegations. Additionally, Swetnick and Avenatti have been referred for criminal investigation by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
These three cases of serious sexual misconduct and assault allegations against the Justice have major issues with their presentation, facts and evidence. Considering these women have waited till Kavanaugh’s appointment to the highest court in the country to release their allegations of these crimes, the motivations of these individuals has been seriously under question.
On Sept. 14, Pogrebin and Kelly published an article to the times overviewing the allegations pressed against Kavanaugh, the subject of their new book. The journalists presented all of the allegations including a new “previously (to Sept. 14th) unreported story” against Kavanaugh.
However, this time the allegation was not made public by the victim but by a bystander. “A classmate, Max Stier, saw Mr. Kavanaugh with his pants down at a different drunken dorm party, where friends pushed his penis into the hand of a female student.”
The strange part is that Pogrebin and Kelly failed to state in the initial publication of the article that the supposed victim refused to be interviewed and that her friends say she doesn’t even recall the event.
These three cases of serious sexual misconduct and assault allegations against the Justice have major issues with their presentation, facts and evidence.
— Graham Wood '20
The New York Times authors decided to release that information the next day, as if it were only a simple correction.
Considering many top political figures took this information as fact and accused Kavanaugh of yet another allegation, even pushing for his impeachment from office, I don’t think it was any accident by the Times to omit this crucial and important fact from the initial publication.
I believe this action by Pogrebin and Kelly was an intentional move to wrongly discredit Kavanaugh and further discredit the justice’s reputation.
A common theme can be taken away from these several allegations, it is this: there has been a categorical attempt by Kavanaugh’s opposition to take down our democratically elected justice.
Related Stories
