Watch Kamala Harris Expertly Question Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh on Reproductive Rights
The second day of the Brett Kavanaugh Supreme Court confirmation hearings went late into the night Wednesday, but Senator Kamala Harris (D–Calif.) was ready when it was her time to question President Trump's nominee for the highest court in the land.
As a former prosecutor (and former Attorney General of California), Harris has perfected her cross-examination technique and it is quite a sight to behold. Watching her line of questioning in Senate hearings has become a thing to watch. But there was one question in particular that had many women across the country cheering from their living rooms.
"Can you think of any laws that give the government the power to make decisions about the male body?" Harris asked Kavanaugh. When he offered to answer a more specific question, she clarified, "Male versus female." Then, she repeated the question.
Kavanaugh stumbled over his words and finally responded: "I'm not thinking of any right now, Senator."
There it is, right there—the crux of the frustration for women (and men) who believe in reproductive freedom. There is no comparable situation where the government gets to make bodily decisions for men in this country.
His answer is one of concern for those watching to see how Kavanaugh handles questions about women's reproductive freedom. In an interview with Glamour shortly after Trump announced his nomination, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand expressed her fears that women would seek illegal abortions if the conservative judge was confirmed.
"We are at the brink of not having reproductive freedom in this country, not having the ability to decide when and how many children we're going to have," Gillibrand told Glamour. "This nominee believes that a boss should decide whether I get access to birth control…. We should fight back with everything we have—because everything's at stake." And Washington Sen. Patty Murray told Glamour that a Kavanaugh confirmation would create “a court [with] five men on it who will overturn Roe v. Wade.”
Kavanaugh continued to evade discussion of his views on Roe v. Wade when asked by Harris whether he believed that a woman's right to privacy included her right to terminate a pregnancy. He danced around the issue of nominee precedent, saying that he should not comment on specific cases and the importance of judicial independence. (While Kavanaugh has been quoted as saying Roe v. Wade is "settled law," a 2003 leaked email provided to the New York Times and published Thursday shows the judge challenging whether the case was "settled law of the land.")
Harris didn't just grill Kavanaugh on women's rights; she also spent eight minutes on the Mueller investigation of possible collusion with Russia and asked Kavanaugh if he believed there was blame on both sides (referencing Trump's response for the violence in Charlottesville, VA last year during a white supremacist rally). He evaded concrete answers on both issues. "I am not here to assess comments made in the political arena, because the risk is I'll be drawn into the political arena," Kavanaugh said regarding Charlottesville.
Twitter was very much here for Harris' tough questions and no-nonsense approach to the hearings.
The hearings continue today with more questioning from the members of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
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