While Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh should shake hands with Fred Guttenberg, he was right not to shake Guttenberg’s hand when the latter surprised him on Tuesday. Guttenberg, the father of a victim who was killed in the Parkland school massacre in February, tweeted that Kavanaugh had disrespected him.
[More: White House defends Brett Kavanaugh after run-in with father of Parkland shooting victim]
Just walked up to Judge Kavanaugh as morning session ended. Put out my hand to introduce myself as Jaime Guttenberg’s dad. He pulled his hand back, turned his back to me and walked away. I guess he did not want to deal with the reality of gun violence.
— Fred Guttenberg (@fred_guttenberg) September 4, 2018
Guttenberg is wrong. As a public figure in a highly contentious hearing at a pre-announced (albeit somewhat secured) location, Kavanaugh must take his security seriously. And video of the incident shows that Guttenberg attempted to surprise Kavanaugh in a way that made the latter understandably alarmed.
While we see one individual usher Kavanaugh away, it’s not clear whether he was assigned to protect the judge: he is wearing a non-standard issue ear piece and seems to be on his own (the vast majority of protection details involve at least two officers/agents). Regardless, the security concern here is no small interest. After all, judges like Kavanaugh continue to face serious threats to their lives. The federal judge presiding over Paul Manafort’s first trial, for example, now travels with a U.S. Marshal service protective detail due to the threats he has received.
Moreover, from its dedicated Judicial Security Division, the Marshals service investigates hundreds of threats to federal judges and court officials each year. The threat level is severe enough that some officials receive full-time or travel-focus protective details based on evolving assessments of the threats they face. Their number includes Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein (one of the deputy marshals on Rosenstein’s detail can be seen following him at the 10-second mark in the video above) and the Supreme Court justices when they travel outside of Washington, D.C.
So yes, while Guttenberg probably deserves a handshake from the Supreme Court nominee, his anger over the first incident is wholly without merit.
