Senators should question Christine Blasey Ford on her allegations against Supreme Court nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, and then question Kavanaugh himself. If possible, they should also question Mark Judge, the other man that Ford accuses of being in the room during the alleged assault.

But how to do so speedily and without making this into a circus?

One solution would be to have all 100 U.S. senators – with the Judiciary Committee as questioners – attend a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility, or SCIF, on Capitol Hill. There, the committee could question their witnesses outside the partisan whirlwind and without creating a show trial atmosphere. Employed for highly-sensitive discussions on matters of national security, SCIFs mitigate opportunities for eavesdropping. SCIF-based hearings would thus afford senators the opportunity to get the information they need to make their committee vote on schedule this Thursday, or shortly thereafter. But it would do so in a way that minimized the risk of these proceedings being made public. That's a very important objective for two reasons.

[More: Kavanaugh calls sexual misconduct allegation 'completely false,' offers to speak with Senate Judiciary Committee]

First, because those who make allegations of this serious nature deserve the same measure of privacy that media outlets apply during the normal course of events. Any public hearing would subject Ford to great partisan rancor without any benefit to the process of justice or the vote on Kavanaugh. Indeed, it would risk corralling senators to the whims of their various partisan bases rather than to what they believe is the truth (incidentally, this is why the Supreme Court is right not to televise its hearings). A public hearing would also subject Kavanaugh to a drumhead-style inquisition. That is unacceptable because Kavanaugh must be presumed an innocent longtime public servant, and because any such hearing would cause his family unnecessary suffering.

The key here is how to inform senators with the insights they need in order to vote. SCIF-based hearings offer one answer.