Washington (CNN) On Thursday afternoon, lawyers for Christine Blasey Ford indicated she would be willing to come to Washington to testify in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee sometime next week, a major shift from her stance earlier in the week that she would not sit for an interview unless and until the FBI looked into her allegations that Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a party in the 1980s.

That now means that Ford is nearly certain to tell her story publicly sometime next week. And that is bad news for Kavanaugh's chances at confirmation.

Here's why. Prior to her latest response, the growing expectation in Washington was that Kavanaugh's confirmation had been righted after being rocked by Ford's allegation last week. The belief was that Ford would not meet the deadline of 10 a.m. Friday that Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, set to let the committee know whether she planned to attend to the Monday hearing. Which meant the hearing wouldn't happen. Which meant a vote in the Judiciary Committee would happen. And given Republicans' Senate majority -- and the unity emerging behind Kavanaugh -- that meant he was almost certainly going to be confirmed to the Court.

If I had to put a percentage on Kavanaugh's chances of confirmation prior to Thursday, I would say 90%. Maybe higher.

But assuming that Ford and Grassley can come to some sort of agreement on a) a day for her to appear next week and b) the parameters of her testimony, Kavanaugh's confirmation chances drop -- maybe precipitously. (For the record: I am assuming that Ford will be accommodated -- even if the hearing on Monday needs to be moved back a few days. Everyone -- from Grassley to President Donald Trump -- has expressed a desire to hear her side of the story.)

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