Silicon Valley quietly got involved in the bitter fight over Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Supreme Court.
A new book revealed a handful of executives from big tech companies aided Christine Blasey Ford before and after she went public with allegations that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in the early 1980s.
Among those who assisted Ford in the summer of 2018 were Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, game company Zynga founder Mark Pincus, and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, according to The Education of Brett Kavanaugh, written by New York Times reporters Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly and on shelves Tuesday.
Sandberg, through her sister, Michelle, advised Ford to retain a lawyer after Ford relayed her alleged encounter with Kavanaugh to Rep. Anna Eshoo and Sen. Dianne Feinstein, both California Democrats, in late July 2018, the book revealed. The Facebook executive also compiled a list of attorneys who Sandberg heard specialized in cases like Ford’s, which was given to a friend of Ford’s through Sandberg’s sister.
Ford ended up hiring Debra Katz and Lisa Banks of the firm Katz, Marshall & Banks, which handles whistleblower and employment matters and was recommended by Feinstein’s office.
Pincus and Hoffman, meanwhile, lent Ford and her friends their private plane and hired a flight attendant when they traveled to Washington, D.C., for the high-stakes Sept. 27 hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, during which Ford and Kavanaugh both testified.
The private jet “had been secured through colleagues of [Ford’s] as a way to simplify the travel and avoid public attention,” according to the book.
In the lead-up to the explosive Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Pogrebin and Kelly wrote, Ford’s supporters “canvassed a small group of wealthy local residents to see if they would be willing to provide transportation,” and Pincus and Hoffman offered up their jet.
The two are major Democratic backers and donated to Hillary Clinton’s and Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns.
According to the book, Hoffman and Pincus decided to cover the flight because they wanted to help Ford and believed she should “have a chance to air her information.”
“They also knew well how radioactive the situation had become, given that their own pilots had been anxious to interact with Ford and her friends for fear of being identified and harassed by Ford’s detractors later,” Kelly and Pogrebin wrote. “To assuage the pilot’s concerns, the billionaires hired a flight attendant to work the trip.”
Ford accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her during a small gathering at a house in suburban Maryland in 1982, revelations that roiled Kavanaugh’s already contentious confirmation battle.
Kavanaugh vehemently denied Ford’s claims. The FBI conducted a supplemental investigation after Ford and two other women accused Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct, though it yielded no corroborating evidence. He was confirmed to the Supreme Court by a slim 50-48 vote in October.
