- Title: Prosecutor Rachel Mitchell selected for Kavanaugh hearing
- Date: 26th September 2018
- Summary: WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES (FILE - SEPTEMBER 5, 2018) (UNRESTRICTED POOL) SUPREME COURT NOMINEE BRETT KAVANAUGH APPROACHING DESK KAVANAUGH TALKING DURING CONFIRMATION HEARING PROTESTERS KAVANAUGH TALKING
- Embargoed: 10th October 2018 23:19
- Keywords: Rachel Mitchell photo Brett Kavanaugh judge hearing
- Location: PHOENIX, ARIZONA, UNITED STATES; WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES;
- City: PHOENIX, ARIZONA, UNITED STATES; WASHINGTON, D.C., UNITED STATES;
- Country: USA
- Reuters ID: LVA0028Z9MS07
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: Hoping to salvage the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh and cement a conservative majority on the U.S. Supreme Court for a generation, Republicans have chosen a woman who prosecuted sex crimes in Arizona to question President Donald Trump's nominee about sexual assault allegations.
In a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, Rachel Mitchell, and not the Republican committee members, all of whom are male, will question Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford, who has accused him of sexually assaulting her in high school.
Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley said they chose Mitchell for her experience and objectivity. She is on leave as chief of the special victims division in the Maricopa County Attorney's Office in Phoenix, Arizona.
As the special victims division head, she supervises prosecutors handling cases of sexual assault, child molestation, child prostitution and computer-related sexual offenses. She had served as a prosecutor since 1993.
Blasey Ford's attorneys have objected to the use of an outside counsel at Thursday's hearing, saying Ford has repeatedly requested that senators handle the questioning.
Ford, a university professor in California, has accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her in 1982 when both were students at a private high school in Bethesda, Maryland, a suburb of Washington. Her allegations, along with those of another woman, have put Kavanaugh's lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court in jeopardy. Kavanaugh has denied the allegations. - Copyright Holder: POOL (CAN SELL)
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