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The FBI admitted that it received more than 4,500 hints during the background check of Judge Brett Kavanaugh of the Supreme Court, and has long questioned the bureau’s review process almost three years after the confirmation of the Senate. It caused a new wave of criticism from the members.
Kavanaugh was confirmed by a narrow majority (50-48), but his confirmation was of the emotional testimony of Christine Blasey Ford, a professor at the University of California, who accused the candidate of sexual assault in the early 1980s and of Kavanaugh’s anger. Defined by denial.
In a June 30 letter released by lawmakers Thursday, FBI assistant director Jill Tyson did not elaborate on the content of the chip information.
In response to previous inquiries from Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (Delaware) and Christopher Coons (Delaware), Kavanaugh’s nomination was made by the FBI to receive information during a Senate confirmatory investigation. He said it was the first time a chipline had been established. ..
“The approval of your letter supports and explains a number of credible personal and corporate explanations that contacted the FBI with information very relevant to Judge Kavanaugh’s allegations of sexual misconduct, but was ignored. “Masu,” said White House and Coons. A letter to FBI Director Christopher Ray with the addition of five other Senate Democrats. “If the FBI doesn’t allow or follow up on any of the chips it receives from the chipline, it’s quite difficult to understand the point of having a chipline.”
Grabbing the FBI’s newly disclosed letter, Ford’s lawyers Debra Katz and Lisa Banks called the treatment of the Bureau of Investigation in Kavanaugh a “fake and major institutional failure.”
“The FBI not only refused to interview the backers in the letter to Dr. Ford and FBI Secretary Ray, but could act on the more than 4,500 tips he received about the then nominee Kavanaugh. I couldn’t, “said the lawyer. “Instead, it passed the information to the White House, allowing supporters of Kavanaugh to falsely claim that the FBI did not find any fraud.”
According to Tyson, the FBI’s security department, which is in charge of the candidate’s background checks, provided “all relevant tips” to the White House advisory office that requested the review. However, the official letter does not say how much it was shared with the White House.
Tyson said in an FBI letter that the agency’s responsibility for background checks on candidates is different from its criminal investigation function. When a presidential candidate is involved, the FBI collects and provides information to the White House to help authorities determine the “fitness” of their job.
“The FBI’s function is … purely fact-finding,” Tyson said. “The authorities, policies, and procedures (identifications) that the FBI relies on to carry out are not the same as the authorities, policies, and procedures used to investigate criminal issues,” she said.
In its background research role, the FBI conducted a Kavanaugh review at the request of the White House Advisory Office and interviewed 49 people in the five days prior to announcing the results on July 18, 2018.
Two months later, after Blasey Ford’s allegations were published during a Senate Judiciary Committee wrench session, the White House demanded a supplementary but limited investigation. During the six days, the FBI interviewed 10 more people.
“The FBI was once again acting as a (background agent), not as a criminal investigation agency, so the authorities, policies, and procedures used in the criminal investigation did not apply,” Tyson wrote. “The FBI completed a limited investigation on October 4, 2018 and provided the results to the requesting entity (White House).”
Wade Henderson, interim president and chief executive officer of the Civil and Human Rights Leadership Council, claimed Thursday that the review was “terribly mistreated.”
“The Trump White House and Senate Republicans havetened the process and shyly suppressed the investigation to guarantee their candidates a seat in the Supreme Court,” Henderson said. “These rude actions undermine the constitutional role of the Senate and continue to cast a shadow over the integrity of the court.”
This article was originally published in USA TODAY: Brett Kavanaugh’s review gave the FBI 4,500 tips
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