The Senate needs a new process for handling allegations against a nominee, not a one-time fix to the specific problems on display on Thursday.
In Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s hearing, the Senate Judiciary Committee proved that they were incapable of investigating the allegations against him. There were few questions of substance asked. Senators preferred posturing for the camera to drilling down on details. The real issue on trial seemed to be the handling of the allegations shared with Democrats by Christine Blasey Ford rather than the allegations themselves. And the entire process was driven by partisan anger.
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The underlying problem to this judiciary drama is that in the political firestorm of Trump’s Washington, the idea of objective pursuit of truth itself has become a partisan exercise of grandstanding for television cameras.
This is unlikely to go away and will likely persist in future hearings and nominations. That is unacceptable, and the Senate, if unable to do their job properly and ensure the integrity of America’s highest court, must come up with a better long-term fix to this process.
I would suggest that those senators set aside their differences and agree on the one thing that should be obvious to all involved: What happened on Thursday didn’t work.
Instead, they should have a process for fielding allegations or evidence against an individual for confirmation and then turning that information over to the FBI for a full investigation.
If, in that process, a hearing is deemed necessary, there must be outside analysis of the necessity of calling specific witness and then, when and if they are called, they must not be questioned by senators. Both parties could instead hire outside attorneys and have them ask questions in a block without interruption.
Republicans seemed to understand this in hiring Rachel Mitchell. They erred when they pulled her from her from questioning of Kavanaugh and instead devolved into righteous rants for the camera.
Although this would likely still be an imperfect process and there may always be lingering questions after such an investigation is conducted, at least the process would be far less likely to be compromised by the partisan vitriol on display this week.
For the country, the court system, and the people whose cases and rights will be decided by judges confirmed by the Senate, mitigating the partisanship is essential.
Most importantly, this cannot be a one-time fix to be re-litigated with each new nominee and the possibility of allegations. On Thursday, the Senate proved that it could not handle this sort of investigation, and now they must fix the process for this hearing and those to come.
