Senate Judiciary Committee report on the Kavanaugh allegations

The Senate Judiciary Committee report on the Kavanaugh allegations records evidence gathered during the committee’s investigation of allegations against Brett Kavanaugh during his confirmation proceedings. Its cited material includes Russell Ford’s declaration and written statements from Mark Judge and P. J. Smyth. Together, those documents show both what the record preserved and how the committee’s choices about witness participation shaped the inquiry.

Identity and Scope

The report is cited under the formal title Senate Judiciary Committee Investigation of Numerous Allegations Against Justice Brett Kavanaugh During the Senate Confirmation Proceedings. The cited report is dated November 2, 2018, and serves as a documentary source for accounts and statements associated with the committee’s investigation. The material available here identifies particular passages rather than establishing the report’s complete findings or conclusions.

Accounts Preserved in the Record

One cited passage comes from a declaration by Russell Ford. It records that Christine Blasey Ford was eventually able to get away from the incident she had described. The declaration thus contributes a family member’s account to the documentary record, alongside Christine Blasey Ford’s own allegation. The report also records written statements from Mark Judge and P. J. Smyth, both of whom Christine Blasey Ford recalled as being present at the party. Judge acknowledged his high-school friendship with Kavanaugh but said he did not remember such a party and had not seen Kavanaugh behave as Ford described. Smyth likewise said he had no memory of the gathering, described Kavanaugh as a person of great integrity, and said he had not seen him behave improperly toward women. These are the witnesses’ stated positions, not findings that resolve the competing accounts.

Procedure and Significance

Ford’s attorneys asked the committee to subpoena Judge so that he could testify in person. The committee staff declined to treat a subpoena as a condition of Ford’s testimony and instead accepted Judge’s written statement; it accepted Smyth’s statement in the same manner. The report’s cited pages preserve those responses as part of the investigation’s record, while the surrounding account makes clear that the potential witnesses were not required to answer questions in person. That procedural choice narrowed the inquiry to written denials of recollection rather than live testimony from the two men Ford identified. The report is therefore significant not only as a repository for statements, but as a record of an investigation whose evidentiary limits were shaped by decisions about who would be heard and in what form.