Schumer: Republicans Push For Shocking New Levels of Secrecy On Kavanaugh’s Records, Demand That All Documents Being Turned Over To Congress Be Kept Hidden From American Public And Even Most of The Senate

Washington, DC –Last night, Republican lawyers working for President George W. Bush turned over the first batch of Judge Kavanaugh’s documents to the Senate Judiciary Committee.  Included in the cover letter for the documents was an assertion that even this small subset of documents being turned over to the Senate needed to be kept confidential outside of the Senate Judiciary Committee members and staff – leaving most of the Senate and the American people in the dark. 

Today Senator Chuck Schumer released the following statement:

 “This unprecedented effort on the part of Republicans to keep hidden Judge Kavanaugh’s records from the American public, and even the large majority of Senators, is a new and astonishing level of secrecy.  It apparently wasn’t enough to limit which documents they requested from the White House Counsel’s office, or to block the release of critical records from the nominee’s final three years in the White House, and it evidently wasn’t enough to require that the small minority of documents they turn over to the Senate be pre-screened by Republican operatives – they are now claiming that that even those documents be kept under lock and key for who knows how long.  This is outrageous and Americans are rightly asking – what are they hiding?” 

BACKGROUND:

Throughout Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination, Republicans have pursued secrecy at every turn.  First they blocked access to Kavanaugh’s record as White House Staff Secretary – which includes the vast majority of the documents from his time at the White House.  Then they only asked for a portion of his documents from the White House Counsel’s office.  Then they established a process where a team led by a Republican lawyer working for President Bush and tied to the Trump White House and Steve Bannon gets to pre-screen documents.  Yesterday, we learned from the National Archives that they would not be able to produce the complete set of official, government-reviewed documents until the end of October, meaning that the only papers the American people will likely see are those pre-screened by Republican operatives. 

Today, the Republicans sunk to a new level of secrecy.  When turning over the first batch of 125,000 documents – that have been pre-screened by the Republican operative Bill Burck – to the Senate Judiciary Committee yesterday, the committee was informed that Republicans want the documents to be kept confidential outside of committee members and staff, until an independent review can be done by the archives – something that won’t be completed until the end of October. 

This means that the American public and all Senators not on the judiciary committee will be prevented from viewing any new documents from Kavanaugh’s time in the White House.  This has never happened in the history of Supreme Court confirmation hearings.

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