It is not enough that Republicans got The Big Win, forcing through Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation to the Supreme Court after an abridged FBI investigation into allegations he committed sexual assault as a teenager. That went neatly with the near-zero investigation into whether he lied under oath while testifying before the Senate, of which there is substantial evidence, or into his mysterious debts that were mysteriously paid off just before his nomination. Now they've broken the line, the generals have directed their forces to take the field in full. So the effort has begun in earnest to turn the newest Associate Justice of the Supreme Court from The Accused into The Victim.

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

That effort really hit its stride during the phony swearing-in ceremony that took place Monday night at the White House. While previous confirmed nominees—including Elena Kagan, an Obama pick—have attended receptions at the presidential manse after the final vote, it is considered improper to have the head of the Executive Branch swear them in. (This is a relic of the bygone era where separation of powers was considered an important constitutional feature.) In fact, Kavanaugh had already been properly sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts. But Donald Trump, American president, insisted not just on swearing him in again. He turned the whole thing into a garish campaign event, and into an ode to Brett Kavanaugh, Victim-Martyr:

It seems like a waste of time at this point to point out this kind of behavior further undermines public faith in the Court as a non-partisan and impartial adjudicator of the law. Trump has never cared about such things, but the Kavanaugh process has laid bare that none of his Republican allies do, either. The nominee did an interview with presidential pravda network Fox News the week of the Ford hearing, and that hearing quickly devolved into a partisan food-fight once Lindsey Graham really kicked off the festivities. The whole process was shown, clear as day, to be a group of Republicans getting a Republican installed on the Court. Perhaps our nation's highest court was never the above-the-fray, justice-is-blind entity it pretended to be. But now the public can be sure of that, and its legitimacy is in tatters.

One other little quibble here is that Kavanaugh was by no means "proven innocent," as the president declared triumphantly. As Republicans on the Judiciary Committee—and Kavanaugh—said or shouted repeatedly during the process, the FBI does not render a verdict or a conclusion when it reports the results of a background-check investigation. Agents simply compile more evidence for decision-makers to work with.



Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

This used to be Kavanaugh and his allies' dodge when asked why they did not support a probe. The nominee said it over and over again from the witness chair. (Behind closed doors, White House Counsel Don McGahn advised the president that a wide-ranging investigation, which the president initially supported, would be "potentially disastrous.") The FBI report is being kept sealed, but there is no indication the Bureau broke with protocol and declared Kavanaugh's innocence here. That Senate Republicans voted for Kavanaugh after seeing the report is also obviously no proof of innocence. That Kavanaugh denies all the allegations against him, even under oath, is also no sure thing based on his record. Even if you do not believe Ford's allegations, to say he was proven innocent is a lie.

Win McNamee Getty Images

But the real theme here was the idea Kavanaugh was the target of some unholy campaign of personal destruction. This hinges on the notion now making its way towards Conservative Canon status that Dr. Christine Blasey Ford (along with Deborah Ramirez and Julie Swetnick) made her allegations against Kavanaugh as part of some Democratic Party conspiracy. Yesterday, the president staked the claim outright and called the whole thing a "hoax." Of course, this theory implicitly holds that Ford is either a dupe or a liar, something Republicans have mostly lacked the courage to at least say outright.



The theory also holds that Brett Kavanaugh is a victim, which is now key to the Republican strategy to rewrite the history of his confirmation process. Where the president once said Ford was a "credible" witness and "moderate" Republicans play-acted their anguish over her testimony before voting "yes" all the same, the party's leadership has now moved towards painting a picture of themselves hunkered down in a bunker against The Unruly Mob and The Fake News Media. The notion was seconded by Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader and certainly the most maniacally cynical man to walk the halls of Congress in the 21st century.

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

The only surprise here is that McConnell would use "literally" like a suburban teen. The senators were not "literally under assault," because they were not assaulted. (This formulation is particularly grotesque considering Dr. Ford's testimony.) But it's no shock to see Senate Republicans—a group almost completely made up of very wealthy white men who control the nation's highest legislative body—portrayed as hapless victims here. Of course, the people accosting them were often their constituents, people they pledged to represent in office and who have a constitutional right to seek a redress of grievances through protest. There's a debate over which public figures deserve to be accosted in public, but the idea senators rushing through a controversial lifetime appointment to the nation's highest court are not on the list, particularly as they walk down the hall or get in an elevator at the Capitol, is absurd.

The reason they're making the argument, though, is to try to shift the bounds of the battlefield to cement their victory in the public record. It is not sufficient that Kavanaugh was confirmed; the opposition to his confirmation must be made illegitimate. It's a crazed mob, an unruly mass of nameless and faceless individuals who will not listen to reason—who would, in the words of some Kavanaugh defenders, "lynch" this upstanding white man. (In some Alex Jonesian formulations, including the president's, these protesters—many of whom say they are sexual assault survivors—are being paid by George Soros.) Soon, they'll come for "your husband, your son," as the president said at a rally recently. That's taken hold with The Base in a big way, even if the actual sons involved don't always agree. Even if this strategy does not succeed in shoring up the court's legitimacy, it might get the right folks out to vote.

JIM WATSON Getty Images

Advertisement - Continue Reading Below

Perhaps we should have all foreseen this would devolve into a festival of white male victimhood. One thing to remember amid the avalanche of rhetoric is that Kavanaugh was sitting for a job interview. He wanted a promotion. That the prospect of his being denied that promotion was compared to the extrajudicial murder of black men by actual crazed mobs tells you all you need to know about the blinding brightness of privilege. Some corners of the media got out over their skis on subsequent allegations, but even Republican senators won't directly take on Dr. Ford's claims. They now seem to say they believe she was assaulted, but that she's confused about who did it.

"Due process" and the "presumption of innocence" figured prominently in defenses of the nominee, including from the president last night. Those are important features of the criminal justice system, when the full power of the state can be leveraged to deprive someone of life and liberty. In this case, the accused was seeking a shiny new job, and had many of the most powerful people in the country—the president and his allies in the Senate—on his side. He was at no risk of losing his liberty, only something to which he felt, at the very core of his being, he was entitled.

Oh—and he got it.