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Double Standards: Comparing Media Coverage of Biden & Kavanaugh Allegations

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Five weeks ago, Tara Reade, a former Senate staffer for Joe Biden, accused the likely Democratic presidential nominee of a 1993 sexual assault.  Despite the emergence of information that seems to provide some corroboration for the charge, no Biden surrogate had not been asked about the matter until this week.  Biden still has not been asked.

This approach from the media looks a lot different than the feeding frenzy that took place in September 2018, when the media went rifling through Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s past after Christine Blasey Ford accused Kavanaugh of assaulting her in the early 1980’s.

Even with Ford unable to name the location or the year of her alleged assault and none of the supposed witnesses backing up her story, the media waged a relentless effort to find a pattern of such conduct by Kavanaugh – even giving credence to assertions that he was a gang rapist.

So what are we learning about the media and some politicians who seem to have very different standards for such accusations, depending upon the circumstances?  And what is the responsible way for the media to approach any story like this?

We get answers from Judicial Crisis Network President Carrie Severino, co-author of the #1 bestseller “Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Court.”

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Hemingway, Severino Dissect Latest Anti-Kavanaugh Smear

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Over the weekend, the New York Times mentioned a previously unreported allegation about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s conduct while a student at Yale University. But there were some big problems with the accusation.

First, the person alleging a different lewd incident involving Kavanaugh did not speak to the New York Times. The reporters in the story, who are also set to release a book on Kavanaugh, only spoke to people who say they are familiar with the accusation.

Even more shocking, the Times initially failed to report that the alleged victim in this story has no recollection of the incident in question. The Times finally added that piece of information after being called out by Mollie Hemingway, a senior editor at The Federalist.

Hemingway and Judicial Crisis Network Chief Counsel Carrie Severino are the authors of the #1 bestseller “Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Supreme Court.”

In this interview with Greg Corombos, Hemingway and Severino discuss this latest attempt to accuse Justice Kavanaugh and why they are not at all surprised at this new effort to sully his reputation.

They also discuss the long-term goals of Democrats with respect to the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary, and they reveal the immense political pressure applied to one of Christine Blasey Ford’s high school friends last year to verify Ford’s initial accusation against Kavanaugh – even though she knew nothing about it.

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Cuomo Blames Trump for Lost Revenue, Dem Voters Sticking with Northam, Fairfax Accuser Hires Ford’s Lawyers

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America see a teachable moment as New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo blames President Trump and the GOP tax reform for many wealthy people leaving his state over high taxes, but the solution would seem to be pretty simple.  They’re also surprised to see 50 percent of Democratic voters in Virginia approving of Ralph Northam as governor – even after the yearbook controversy.  And they react to the accuser of Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax hiring Christine Blasey Ford’s legal team.

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Grassley Getting Fed Up, Flip-Flop Flake, Corroboration Games

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America applaud Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley for not humoring scurrilous accusations against Brett Kavanaugh and for demanding Dr. Ford turn over the evidence she claims will back up her allegations.  They also shake their heads as Sen. Jeff Flake suggests Kavanaugh’s demeanor towards committee Democrats is not something that belongs on the Supreme Court, making them wonder whether Republicans really have the votes for confirmation.  And they throw up their hands at how both sides react to Ford’s former boyfriend stating under oath that she helped a friend prepare for a polygraph examination, which would contradict her sworn testimony.  Some conservatives are treating the allegation as fact while liberals are suddenly horrified by the prospect of reporting uncorroborated accusations.

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Fmr. U.S. Civil Rights Commissioner: Feinstein Played Ford Like A Pawn

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A former commissioner of the U.S. Civil Right Commission believes the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee played Dr. Christine Ford “like a pawn” and did not really care if the allegation was true so long as it helped to derail President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court and make her pro-choice allies happy.

Jennifer Braceras is an attorney and a senior fellow at the Independent Women’s Forum.  She says California Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s decision to hold onto Ford’s letter for weeks rather than bring the matter to the full committee betrays her real motivation.

“It’s not just a procedural mistake.  It was a deliberate act on Sen. Feinstein’s part.  What that tells me is that is not a woman who is concerned about the possibility of a serial predator taking a seat on the Supreme Court.

“She didn’t care if Dr. Ford was telling the truth or if she was making the whole thing up.  Feinstein’s objective was not to protect the court from a potential rapist or to protect the court from Brett Kavanaugh.  Her goal was to protect the court from any Trump nominee, which is why she held it,” said Braceras.

Braceras says the right thing to do would have been to ask the FBI to investigate to allegation without going public with it, and that if she deemed the accusation to be true, that she could have urged Republicans to join her in asking Trump to name another nominee.

“That’s what I would have done, but Dianne Feinstein wasn’t concerned about that, because she didn’t believe that,” said Braceras.

In addition, Braceras says the Democrats are doing the bidding of Planned Parenthood and other pro-choice groups because Kavanaugh could tilt the balance of the court in a way Neil Gorsuch could not by replacing Antonin Scalia last year.

“The left has long believed that the only thing that stands between women and the back alley is Anthony Kennedy.  That’s why when Kennedy retired, they became hysterical,” said Braceras.  “So they were going to fight tooth and nail to stop any jurisprudential conservative from filling that seat.  They made that clear from the beginning.”

Braceras does worry that confirming Kavanaugh under such a cloud – even without any corroborating evidence – could stain the legitimacy of the Supreme Court, but she says that is Plan B for the Democrats if Kavanaugh is confirmed.

She says eroding the legitimacy of the court is the the long game for the Democrats and Republicans need to play their own long game.

“We need to double down on teaching basic American civics.  The reason that we’re always caught playing defense in these battles is because most Americans don’t understand the proper role of the court,” said Braceras.

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Toensing: FBI Probe Pointless

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Washington is abuzz this weekend over news that will most likely result in learning nothing new about Dr. Christine Ford’s sexual assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

On Friday, just hours after announcing he would support Kavanaugh’s confirmation, Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake announced he would vote the nomination out of committee but not support it on the Senate floor unless an FBI investigation lasting no more than one week examines Ford’s allegations.

But will the FBI probe accomplish anything more than the Senate Judiciary Committee did in gathering statements from all the supposed witnesses?

“Nothing.  They’re going to repeat what the committee has already done,” said former federal prosecutor and Justice Department official Victoria Toensing.

Toensing says the FBI will simply interview the witnesses and write down their responses.  Agents will provide no analysis.

“They don’t ever make a decision about whether this person is credible or not credible.  They just write down the words they are told and they give it and they give it to the committee then.  It’s the committee that decides whether it’s truthful or the allegation is serious or not serious,” said Toensing.

She says this is how the confirmation process is supposed to play out and the Senate Judiciary Committee is supposed to investigate any allegations confidentially.  Toensing blasted California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the committee, for her handling of Ford’s allegation, including assisting Ford behind the scenes prior to an eleventh hour publicizing of the accusation.

She says Feinstein is being rewarded by Flake for bad behavior.

“What Dianne Feinstein did was outrageous and I’m sorry that she’s getting rewarded for it by getting this extra time but the Republicans didn’t have any choice,” said Toensing, who says Flake’s compromise is just the latest example in how the two parties operate.

“The Republicans just aren’t very good at fighting.  They’re not.  Democrats know how to kill.  Republicans bring a little lasso to the gunfight,” said Toensing.

Toensing says all of this is a ploy from Democrats to delay confirmation, pointing out that for weeks Democrats groused about not getting enough paperwork from Kavanaugh’s background.  Now they demand an FBI investigation and already some are publicly wondering whether a week is enough time.

Toensing says we’ll see the same talking points a week from now.

“I predict that next Thursday night or Friday morning, when this week is up, that the Democrats will find reasons to say, ‘We can’t just go ahead now.  Look at this.’  They’re going to ask for another postponement.  They’re like a drowning person, grabbing for anything just to stay afloat,” said Toensing.

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Kavanaugh & Graham Fight Back, Pathetic Media Reaction, Credibility Gap

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America discuss how Brett Kavanaugh’s passionate defense of his character and record and Sen. Lindsey Graham’s denunciation of Senate Democrats galvanized most Republicans around the Kavanaugh nomination.  They also slam the mainstream media for continuing it’s appallingly biased coverage of Kavanaugh, this time horrified that the judge was angry for being accused of being a gang rapist and that his wife and daughters are the recipients of death threats.  And they roll their eyes as Democratic Sen. Dick Blumenthal, who lied about being a Vietnam veteran for years, grilled Kavanaugh on questions of credibility.

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GOP’s Missed Opportunity at Ford Hearing

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Former federal prosecutor Andrew C. McCarthy says Dr. Christine Ford came off as a compelling witness Thursday, but he also says major problems exist with her a account but the Republican-hired counsel failed to ask about them properly.

McCarthy, who is now a contributing editor and columnist at National Review, spoke after Ford’s testimony and before Kavanaugh’s impassioned rebuttal.  McCarthy says sex crimes prosecutor Rachel Mitchell did not make good use of her time.

“Mitchell seemed to think she was conducting a deposition and gathering a bunch of information that could be used later on.  In a proceeding like this, you have to go right to the point,” said McCarthy.

He says there are many holes in Ford’s story understands Republicans deferring to Mitchell since Democrats were ready to pounce with their narrative of eleven white men harassing an alleged sexual assault victim, but he says Mitchell was more focused on being kind than getting the facts.

“She need a ride home somebody.  Yet, she can’t remember how she got to the party.  She can’t remember how she got back.  She doesn’t remember what she said to the first person she saw who would have been the first friendly person there to give her a ride home after she had been through this terrible incident.

“None of those aspects of her story make sense.  And the way that a lawyer would normally handle that at a trial or at a hearing would be to ask her pointed, leading questions about that.  Instead what Mitchell did was ask these sort of open-ended questions.  We got a lot about the topography of Montgomery County and the etiology of PTSD, but we didn’t find out a lot about what went on in that room,” said McCarthy.

McCarthy says the consequences of not challenging Ford’s story are significant.

“If you get to the end, and you haven’t laid a glove on her version of events, then what you’re asking these wobbly senators to do is confirm somebody who there’s good reason to believe attempted to commit a rape,” said McCarthy.

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Duplicitous Dems, Ridiculous Red Wave Complacency, Dowd’s Dangerous Threshold

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Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America are thoroughly disgusted as Senate Democrats unveil their talking points, simultaneously demanding an FBI investigation to the get to the truth of the allegation against Brett Kavanaugh and stating they believe the accuser.  They also shudder as Trump allies and the Republican National Committee are terrified that many Trump voters are thoroughly convinced the Democrats have no chance to win the midterm elections and suggest GOP turnout may suffer as a result.  And they unload on former George W. Bush strategist and current Never Trump ABC News figure Matthew Dowd for suggesting that we should always believe the female in “he said, she said” situations.

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