Mitch McConnell has a warning for Democrats demanding copious documents on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh: Be careful what you wish for.

The Senate majority leader privately told senior Republicans on Wednesday that if Democrats keep pushing for access to upwards of a million pages in records from President Donald Trump’s high court pick, he’s prepared to let Kavanaugh’s confirmation vote slip until just before November’s midterm elections, according to multiple sources.


Delaying the vote past September would serve a dual purpose for McConnell, keeping vulnerable red-state Democrats off the campaign trail while potentially forcing anti-Kavanaugh liberals to swallow a demoralizing defeat just ahead of the midterms. Senators said McConnell believes the Democratic base will be “deflated” if they raise hopes of defeating Kavanaugh only to lose just days before the election.

Democrats have no intention of backing down in their call for maximum transparency about Kavanaugh’s record, but the GOP is betting that they’ll start to sweat the Supreme Court timeline as the summer wears on.

“To me, it’s in their best interest to have that vote done for a lot of their red-state senators who are facing their voters,” GOP Conference Chairman John Thune said.

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The South Dakotan listed two reasons for Democrats to dread a delay: “One is, you’re stuck here, you can’t get home. And two, the vote is going to be of significant consequence in a lot of those races. I don’t know how it’s to their benefit to drag it out.”

McConnell and his party prefer to confirm Kavanaugh by Oct. 1, so the conservative appellate judge can be seated on the nation’s highest court when its annual term begins on the first Monday of that month.

But with Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and his caucus clamoring for the full set of documents from Kavanaugh’s time in the George W. Bush White House, McConnell is making clear that he’s prepared to call Democrats’ bluff — believing their request is a politically-motivated effort to delay the nomination until after they have a shot at the majority.

The Senate typically recesses for much if not all of October during election years, giving members battling for reelection a chance to campaign back in their home states. Should McConnell meet Democratic document demands by staying in session longer before confirming Kavanaugh, a half-dozen of the minority’s senators battling for survival in Trump-won states could lose out on valuable time to make their case to voters.

“We’re witnessing historic obstructionism here,” Sen. David Perdue (R-Ga.) said of Democratic resistance to Trump’s judicial picks and decrying “unreasonable requests for information by people who have already said publicly they’ve made a decision” on Kavanaugh.

Perdue, one of several conservatives who successfully urged McConnell to cancel part of the Senate’s long-running August recess, added that delaying the Supreme Court vote into October is “one option he has. He’s done it before.”

Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Democrats on his committee, led by California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, currently are ocked in tough negotiations over how broad a swath of documents the panel can get from Kavanaugh’s five years in the Bush administration.

During his tenure, Trump’s Supreme Court pick was involved in multiple contentious issues, from post-9/11 security decisions to the confirmation of other high-profile nominees to the federal bench. Kavanaugh also was involved in a discussion about how retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy, the man he’s been tapped to replace, would rule on giving detained terrorist suspects access to counsel.

Grassley warned on Thursday that “you’d better ask me in two weeks” about when Kavanaugh’s hearings could even get scheduled, given the intensity of the talks on releasing records.

“I would love to have him on the court the first day of the new term,” Grassley said. “But I can’t even guarantee that at this point because of the fact that we have a constitutional responsibility to do a thorough and fair hearing.”

Democrats insist they’re holding Kavanaugh to the same standard that governed the release of an estimated 170,000 documents on Justice Elena Kagan’s record before her Supreme Court confirmation. But Republicans protest that Schumer is slowing down Kavanaugh to an extent that they never imposed on Kagan, with the New York Democrat refusing to even meet with Trump’s pick before a document deal is reached.

Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), a Judiciary panel member, said his party is seeking relevant documents and not crafting a fishing expedition designed to drag out Kavanaugh’s confirmation. Yet he also indicated that Democrats would make their requests regardless of the GOP’s preferred Oct. 1 confirmation deadline.

“I can’t tell you whether a million or [1.2 million pages] will mean it’s Oct. 1 or Oct. 2” that Kavanaugh gets a vote, Durbin said. “Nobody knows that. All we can do is ask that.”

Democrats say they have new confidence in their push for more Kavanaugh disclosures after the stunning Thursday withdrawal of appellate court nominee Ryan Bounds over his racially incendiary writings during his college years.

Bounds faced universal Democratic opposition and rare GOP dissent in the narrowly divided Senate. With Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) absent, the Republicans' 51-49 majority has effectively shrunk to 50-49, bringing Democrats tantalizingly close to sinking Kavanaugh if they can stick together.

Even some of Democrats’ most vulnerable red-state residents met McConnell’s warning about a Supreme Court vote closer to the election with little worry.

“It doesn’t bother me either way, whatever they do,” Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) said. “The vote’s going to be taken, sooner or later.”

Asked about being kept from campaigning against GOP challenger Patrick Morrisey in his home state, Manchin replied, “I think they want to go as bad as we want to go on the trail, so we’ll see what happens.”

Even Rep. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who's challenging endangered Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) this fall, cast doubt on the merits of forcing her to squirm over Kavanaugh's confirmation well into October. "I don't have any doubt in my mind that she's going to vote for him," Cramer said.

The possibility that Kavanaugh's confirmation might slip into October first came up during a closed-door lunch for GOP senators on Tuesday; McConnell raised the prospect again Wednesday during a meeting with GOP committee chairman, sources said.

The Kentucky Republican and the Trump White House continue to press ahead with Oct. 1 as their goal for confirmation, and Kavanaugh is seen as likely to prevail given his GOP establishment credentials and the political pressure on red-state Democrats who voted for Justice Neil Gorsuch last year.

Still, for outside liberal activists aiding the Democrats’ bid to defeat Kavanaugh, the prospect of delaying any confirmation until the edge of the midterm vote seems to have far more upside than downside.

Former Schumer aide Brian Fallon, who now helms the group Demand Justice to fight Trump’s judicial nominees, argued that McConnell would take “a loss” if Kavanaugh isn’t on the nation’s highest court by the time its term starts.

“McConnell knows better than anyone that the longer this nomination drags out, the more time it gives for pressure to mount on the pro-choice moderates in his caucus,” Fallon said.

Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas), a senior member of the Judiciary panel, insisted Thursday that McConnell wouldn't "allow unreasonable delay" and that Oct. 1 remains the party's cutoff for confirming Kavanaugh.

However, Cornyn acknowledged, "it could" slip.