After Dr. Ford publicly accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault, people wondered whether or not the Senate committee would vote before she was given a chance to testify at the hearing. After she had the opportunity to testify, the new question arose as to whether or not the committee and Senate vote would be pushed for or if an FBI investigation would be opened. It was announced earlier today, September 28th, that the Senate would vote on the appointment of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court within the next week. The committee decision was 10 to 11, fully divided by political party. However, the Senate committee only passed the nomination on the condition that the FBI investigate the "current credible" sexual assault allegations leveled at Kavanaugh. This condition was introduced by Senator Flake of Arizona in the second meeting of the committee, after he was criticized by two women for his inability to state his opinions aloud in the elevator in the presence of media. The FBI will now have only a week to re-open the background checks for Kavanaugh and then the Senate will proceed with a final vote. It is still quite uncertain as to which direction the Senate will vote by Friday, October 5th, as multiple republican senators, such as Senator Collins and Senator Murkowski, have voiced their support for Senator Flake's decision.
1. Did the two women who cornered Senator Flake in the elevator influence his decision to push for the FBI investigation or did he already posses this idea?
2. Will the outcome of the FBI investigation have any significant influence on the final Senate vote or will the senators still vote along partisan lines? Would it be possible for Kavanaugh's seat to be confirmed even if the FBI investigation did not occur?
3. How might public opinion play a major role in the final Senate vote?
1. I think that being cornered could have definitely pushed him to push for the FBI investigation, but it did not give him the idea to do so. He claimed that the two women influenced him but he had also been talking about hearing from close friends about situations similar to Ford's. Also he already announced that he vote to confirm Kavanaugh, with no condition attached originally.
ReplyDelete2. I think people would still vote along partisan lines. There is a possibility a few slightly Republicans will switch over. I do think that if it turns out that Kavanaugh did in fact sexual assault Ford, Senator Flake would switch his vote and not vote to confirm Kavanaugh. He said he believed Kavanaugh during the elevator confrontation, which suggests that if Kavanaugh was lying, Flake would not support him anymore. I think it is possible for the seat to be confirmed even if the FBI investigation because the Senate was about to previously, it might just take some time to convince Flake to withdraw his condition and go through with his voting.
3. I think it has the possibility to change a lot. The Senate does not want to go against prevailing public opinion. Each senator has a responsibility to their constituents, so they have to weigh what the popular opinion is. I think the public opinion will most affect the Senators who claim to be undecided or the ones who are only slightly in support of Kavanaugh.
1. Did the two women who cornered Senator Flake in the elevator influence his decision to push for the FBI investigation or did he already posses this idea?
ReplyDeleteYes, I belive that it did influence his decision to push for the FBI investigation. While I believe that he already had this idea, the cornering made it more apparent and faster. This was moments after stating his support for Brett Kavanaugh.
2. Will the outcome of the FBI investigation have any significant influence on the final Senate vote or will the senators still vote along partisan lines? Would it be possible for Kavanaugh's seat to be confirmed even if the FBI investigation did not occur?
I belive that it will have litte influence the Senate vote. As we have seen in the past, senators almost always vote along their partisan lines (despite a few), regardless of the facts or case. Senator Flake, for example, already stated his support for Kavanaugh. However, this support was when there was the elevator conflict. His support may change if he finds out that Kavanaugh did infant sexually assault Dr. Ford. I do belive that without the FBI investigation Kavanaugh's seat can still be confirmed.
3. How might public opinion play a major role in the final Senate vote?
Public opinion is a very large influencer. Without the support of public opinion in a large case like this one, senators could be largely looked down upon and not supported, something that nobody wants. The senate wants to look good, in a sense, and make a good impression on the public in order to gain support. the senate has to look at what the public option is in order to be popular.
-tovia sobel
ReplyDeleteJoshua Ishimoto
ReplyDelete1. The two women who confronted Senator Flake on the matter probably influenced his decision for just before then he had decided that he would vote for Kavanaugh on the basis that he was innocent until proven guilty. This is a sound legal basis, but politically it was not. when those two women said that by doing do he was looking over all victims of sexual assault he cracked. Now we are at the point where he, Sen. Collins, and Sen. Murkowski are going to decide the fate of Kavanaugh based on the results of a one-week FBI probe. On a personal note is this a serious investigation or political theater? I could go for some popcorn.
2. I suppose that if there wasn't a FBI probe then the Senate would still hold a vote since it's controlled by Republicans. However, under these circumstances the Kavanaugh vote would have been more partisan than it already is going to be and Senators Flake, Collins, and Murkowski would have a fairly tough decision to make. In all probability it would have been a 50/50 vote with VP Pence breaking the tie by voting for Kavanaugh. The political division from that would be enormous and frankly it would scar the Supreme Court. Now it seems these three senators really are deciding their vote on the outcome of the FBI report and if all three say "nay" then Kavanaugh will go back to his district court and weep for a couple decades.
3. I don't want to be cynical, but many of the Senators will vote along party lines simply because they are in the situation that they have to. The public sees this as a political battle and so it will be. All senators will vote the way their constituents want and you can bet the independence of the Senate will be compromised by it.
Evan Mahaffey
ReplyDelete1. I believe that the pressure from the media influenced his decision more than the actual two women. When the women confronted Senator Flake, it flooded various social media sites and was the main story on many news outlets. Due to this, the pressure on Flake to listen to these two women increased exponentially, and as I believe, influenced his decision. Also, I think that the idea was already lingering in his head, but the two women forced him to act upon it. Talk of a hearing was already there, and he consulted with friends about it, but may have not been planning to act upon it until the confrontation.
2. Already, Senator Flake has gone against his party and compelled the FBI investigation to occur. I believe that the outcome of the investigation will force some of the major votes (Flake, Collins, Machin, Heitkamp, Murkowski) to vote against partisan lines, but only if there is hard evidence that shows proof to the allegations. The votes will stay the same unless there is substantial support from their state to do so, and if not, the votes will be stationary. I feel like Kavanaugh would've definitely been confirmed if the FBI investigation had not been called. The public pressure would be lessened, and the senators would've voted along partisan lines.
3. The public has been very vocal thus far, and will continue to be. I believe that the public will have a large influence on this decision, and all senators are feeling the pressure on how to vote.
1) I believe that the two women in the elevator pished for him to call for an FBI investigation. This is because he is Republican and he wouldn’t want to call for an FBI investigation. It was the constant push from the democrats that made him call for the investigation. The MeToo movement was so powerful and the Republicans kept gettiing attacked for avoiding the investigation. It was the powerful stories of the two women in the elevator that pushed him to call for the investigation.
ReplyDelete2) I don’t think the investigation will have a powerful influence on the decision because our country is so deeply devided that the senators will still elect for who they wanted to elect for before the investigation. As it turns out, the investigation did not have a large impact on the nomination as he was still nominated. It could be because the Democrats are complaining that the investigation wasn’t as comprehensive as it should have been. For example, they did not interview Kavanaugh or Ford and it wasn’t released to the public at all.
3) Public opinion definitely pushed more pressure onto the Senate vote. For instance, Democrats are going to use public opinion to try to derail his nomination, whereas Repiblicans are going to try to defend him. Public opinion is important because people watch the nomination and hear about it on media, so it is definetly very significant for the nomination. But, it didn’t make in impact as we saw he did get elected anyways.
I think he probably had the idea, as this issue should be taken seriously and an investigation should take place.
ReplyDeleteSenators are still going to vote as planned. There will be a few swing votes. However, the GOP wants this seat to be given to Kavanaugh so they hold control of all three houses.
I don't think it will. Senators will vote with their party.
1) I do not believe that it is possible to determine weather or not it was the girls who had the final impact on how he decided to vote. However I believe that it can be assumed that they had some impact on his decision. Human brains r wired to see emotion and thus want to act due to it. I believe that the women's emotions did play a factor, but were not the deciding factor.
ReplyDelete2) The investigation will not have any impact on the way senators vote unless they find him guilty of a federal crime. However since it is nearly impossible the senators will just vote the way they always do, based on their party.
3) Public opinion can play an important role in influencing how senators vote. For example some democratic senators up for re election may vote for kavanaugh in order to help them in the upcoming primaries