Booker Releases New Batch of Kavanaugh Records

He says they raise 'concerning questions' about Supreme Court nominee's honesty
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Sep 13, 2018 5:27 AM CDT
Booker Releases New Batch of Kavanaugh Records
Kavanaugh testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.   (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

Sen. Cory Booker released a new batch of confidential documents about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh Wednesday night, even after a conservative judicial group referred his earlier disclosures to the Senate Ethics Committee. The 28 new documents from Kavanaugh's time in the White House counsel's office during the George W. Bush administration show his involvement in judicial nominations, including for some of the more controversial judges of the era, the AP reports. GOP senators and outside groups are criticizing the Democrat for releasing the documents, which the Judiciary Committee is holding back on a confidential basis that makes them accessible only to senators

The documents released Wednesday show Kavanaugh's involvement in Bush's nomination of Charles Pickering to an appellate court in the South amid questions about his views on race relations. The Senate blocked the nomination, but Bush later made a recess appointment. Pickering has since retired from the bench. Booker said the documents about Kavanaugh's work "raise more serious and concerning questions" about his honesty during his testimony before the committee when he suggested he was not substantially involved in the nominations. The conservative group Judicial Watch, meanwhile, said Booker "explicitly invited his expulsion from the Senate in his egregious violation of the rules and contempt for the rule of law and the Constitution."

(More Cory Booker stories.)

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