Washington (CNN) Justice Sonia Sotomayor in an interview with CNN's David Axelrod said that Justice Brett Kavanaugh was welcomed into the Supreme Court "family" in the wake of his polarizing confirmation process.

"When you're charged with working together for most of the remainder of your life, you have to create a relationship," Sotomayor said in an "Axe Files" interview airing Saturday.

"The nine of us are now a family and we're a family with each of us our own burdens and our own obligations to others, but this is our work family, and it's just as important as our personal family.

"We've probably spent more time with each other than most justices spend, who have spouses, with their spouses," she added.

Kavanaugh, who has served since being confirmed early last month, had his confirmation thrown into doubt after a tense Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in September in which California professor Christine Blasey Ford alleged the Supreme Court nominee had sexually assaulted her when they were in high school in the 1980s. Kavanaugh denied the allegations against him.

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