× Thanks for reading! Log in to continue. Enjoy more articles by logging in or creating a free account. No credit card required. Log in Sign up {{featured_button_text}}

Republican U.S. Senate candidate Corey Stewart said Monday that the 11th-hour revelation of a sexual assault allegation against U.S. Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh is “a bunch of crap” and part of a Democratic attempt to derail Kavanaugh’s nomination.

“I think it’s a bunch of crap,” Stewart, the chairman of the Prince William Board of County Supervisors, said in a phone interview Monday morning. “I really question the timing. The Democrats ... Dianne Feinstein apparently sat on this for weeks,” he said of the California senator. “This is just an intentional attempt to postpone the nomination until after the midterm elections.”

Stewart, who is running against Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said he was not questioning the allegation made by Christine Blasey Ford, a California professor who has accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her at a party more than 30 years ago when the two were high school students in Montgomery County, Md. But Stewart said the timing of the allegation, coming just before an expected Senate vote to confirm Kavanaugh, suggests it’s a “Democratic smear tactic.”