harry reid -- that he's been a supporter of comey and led the fight to get him confirmed, as he believed comey was a principled publicer is va er is. with the teadeepest regret i se was wrong. mr. nadler from new york, the president can fire him for cause and ought to. he violated the guidelines and put his thumb on the scale of an election. mr. cohen from tennessee, a democrat -- calling comey to resign effective immediately. i'm sure upon reflection of this action, he will submit his letter of resignation for the good of the nation. to all my democratic friends, you were all against this guy. now the country is turning upside down because trump did. there's a process of somewhat happened in the 2016 election. it's called mr. mueller. ly do everything i can to make

sure he finishes his job without political interference. and i'm here to tell anybody in the country who listens, that this is so hypocritical of my friends on the other side. when it was their president, kavanaugh was right. when you're talking about roe v. wade, it's okay to promise the nation it will never be overturned. it's okay to pick a democratic staff member of this committee, but it's not okay to pick somebody that's been a life long republican. people see through this. you had a chance and you lost. if you want to pick judges, from your way of thinking, then you better win an election. i voted for two of your choices. soed mi sotomayor and kagan. i got a lot of crap. why did i do it? i thought they were qualified by

any reasonable measure, given the history of the senate. but we have turned the history of the senate upside down. i found that they were different than i would have picked, sotomayor and kagan, but my any reasonable measure they were qualified. you've been on the court for 12 years, you've had 307 decisions. you've been approved before. our own people in the country understand this game. it's a game that i am sad to be part of. it's gotten really bad. the anecdote to our problems in this country when it comes to judges and politics is not to deny you a place on the supreme court. this is exactly who you need to be, this is exactly the time you need to be there, and i am telling president trump, you do some things that drive me crazy, and you do some great things. you've never done anything better in my view to pick

gorsuch and kavanaugh, because you had an opportunity to put well qualified conservatives on the court, men steeped in the rule of law, who apply analysis, not politics, to their decision making, and you knocked it out of the park. to my friends on the other side, you can't lose the election and pick judges. if you want to pick judges, you've got to win! >> let me tell you what -- let me tell everybody what the rest of the day holds for us. judge kavanaugh, you can take a break now that rehad ridwe had y scheduled for 15 minutes, and it may take 15 minutes. so i would like to start after that. so we'll take a 15-minute break, and we have the introducers and then we will hear the statement from the nominee, and then --

>> as we welcome our viewers back to our live coverage head quarter here in new york, a bit of housekeeping. number one, after we just take some notes on what we just witnessed, we'll be joining "deadline: white house" with nicolle wallace from another floor in this building. but first, we are joined by former acting solicitor general of the united states, a gentleman who has argued 37 cases in front of the supreme court. and former attorney with the southern district of new york, along with point s west. what have we witnessed now? >> we are witnessed what was predicted. this hearing has been much more about the nominator donald trump than brett kavanaugh. we have a lot of skirmishing and

fight iing they had 42 document dumped on them the night before, 100,000 pages and nobody has time to review it. >> that's real. >> i heard senator tillis say, oh, there's new modern software that allows you to go through stuff quickly, but i'm not aaware of anything to go through 42,000 documents in six or seven hours. there's more than 100,000 pages withheld by executive privilege. the other problem is the nominator in his own situation. donald trump has been fingered by his own personal lawyer as part of a criminal investigation. kavanaugh was picked from a certain list. we heard ted cruz today, who is a very thoughtful guy, he said, well, this is a president that

has a referendum in 2016, because he put a list out, and said here are my supreme court nominees. and so everyone should defer to kavanaugh. there's only one problem with that, kavanaugh wasn't on that list in 2016. he was only added in november of 2017. so whatever referendum senator cruz said is nonexistent. >> further, if you listen to the comella harris argument, he was policed on the list when the president entered a period of genuine jeopardy. >> that's right. i have to say, brett kavanaugh's argued in front of him, i know he's a lovely guy. and i almost feel bad that he's got the misfortune of being nominated by this president that overshadows his own accomplishments. >> a friend of mine, long republican says of this nominee, as close as the republican party has come to a guy who was raised to be a republican appointed

justice of the supreme court. >> and what's so interesting about him, i think the makeover edition is what we were just talking about. we have a judge who is spoken and acted extensively. when he worked for ken starr, who served maybe the most famous subpoena in history on bill clinton. i would want to see tomorrow, do you still believe that a president should have to answer a subpoena like the one you served on bill clinton 20 years ago? this is a nominee who has written extensively in the law review article, that a sitting president could not be infitted or subject to a civil suit, which conflicts with the paula jones versus bill clinton case. i would want to hear his views on that. do you believe what you believe then, have you changed? and if so, why? we saw a really robust warmup today to what promises to be an interesting fight. >> for the viewers who depend on

us to separate fact from hyperbole, do the democrats have a valid argument that it's unfair that any judge in 2 country would delay a case based on a 40,000-page document dump last night. and b, for the critical appointment in his life when he was staff secretary in the white house, writing about any number of issues, dealing with any number of issues, that's a black hole in the known case work here that, for those two reasons, this should be delayed. is there validity? >> absolutely. senator booker said, five days. what's the harm if we put this off for five days? this judge will be on the bench 20, 30 years, what's the arm? it's become a rhetorical but fair point. if you dare to dump 1/10th of that number on the eve of trial, you would be reprimanded by the

judge and everything pushed off. >> same question. >> it's an iron clad argument. the authority for this is no less than senator grassley himself. and senator cornyn, the two people pushing back at the hearing today. both in 2010, i have the quotes here, said you can't let this kagan nomination go forward until we have all the documents. it's unfair to the committee and the american people. you know, here, i do think it's unfair to judge kavanaugh to have this proceeding go on, these documents are going to come out at some point. if he's confirmed and the documents come out and there's some discrepancy, that's just bad for the court. >> i have to say, i felt well represented today. you've been terrific co-counsel here. to our viewers, a reminder, when judge kavanaugh is ready to give his opening statement, and remember, there's, as you heard, senator grassley say there's a table change and then there are nominators, there are introducers from his life, but

when the kavanaugh statement comes, it being part of the focal point of the day, we'll cover it life and in its entirety. however, now, the it is time for "deadline: white house" with nicolle wallace. a surreal day in politics. president trump slammed in a devastating new account of his presidency, from legendary reporter bob woodward. excepts from the new book breaking in "the washington post" at the same time that judge brett kavanaugh faced opposition from democrats over those tens of thousands of documents withheld by the jump administration. >> mr. chairman, i agree -- [ overlapping speakers ] >> i know this is an exciting day for all of you here, and you're rightly proud -- >> mr. chairman, if we can't be

recognized, i move to adjourn. [ cheers and applause ] >> as the fireworks went off on capitol hill, woodward's explosive account of the trump presidency sent shockwaves throughout official washington. the book includes indictments of donald trump's conduct in office that have never been before compiled in one place, and attributed to so many close advisers to the president. it's the most explicit accounting of the way that the president's own cabinet and senior staff work to protect the country from donald trump's worst instincts. we'll cover all of the details this hour, but we'll start with woodward's account from the president's former attorney in the russia investigation, john dowd. woodward accounts dowd's concerns about president trump's risk of committing perjury if he were to testify before robert mueller -- eller --

>> the woodward excerpts made their way into the public view as the president appears to be at peak rage against his own justice department and own fbi. a source close to the president who spoke to him this weekend telling me the president is in the worst mood of his presidency and is calling friends and allies to vent about his selection of sessions as attorney general and chris wray has fbi director around the clock. welcome to sent, everyone. here to help us, some of our faif ris repovorite reporters a. phil rucker, mike schmidt, joyce

vance is back, and about the table, john heilman, and former democratic congresswoman donna edwards. phil rucker, you have the byline on the new story about bob woodward's book. first, did you read the whole book and take us what seems like explosive new reporting about john dowd's concerns about donald trump. >> yeah. so nicolle, yes, i read it in its entirety. it's a pretty complete and i think you hit the nail on the head when you called it a devastating portrait of the presidency and his power, to focus in on the john dowd examples, there's that practice session in january of this year. woodward describes this in a lot of detail, page after page after page, reconstructing the dialogue between trump and john dowd, as they rehearsed questions that trump would face should he sit for an interview with mueller. the whole point in badwawoodwar

telling is that trump is not fit to be a witness, that he would commit perjury were he to sit down and answer questions from mueller. there are other scenes involving dowd, and the president, negotiations in march with the special counsel leading up to dowd's eventual resignation, as the president's personal lawyer. one thing we should point out, john dowd has put out a statement denying that any practice session occurred and denying other examples in the book. it's unclear who is telling the truth here. woodward explains that he's recorded a lot of the interviews he conducted, the account is based on hundreds of hours of interviews with firsthand sources, as well as government documents and other materials like that. so i guess that will be worked out in the days to come out. but john dowd is contesting some of the characterization. >> phil rucker gave us this january 27th alleged encount we

are -- encounter with the president and this march 5th interaction with john dowd and jay sekulow, a lawer still on board, the special counsel and his deputy. there's some conversation that is in here in phil's story. dowd explains to mueller where he was trying to keep the president from testifying. i'm not going to let him sit here and look like an idiot. everything leaks in washington, and the guys overseas are going to tell you i told you he was abidian idiot. john, i understand, mueller replied. the first time i've ever seen robert mueller quoted in a news story. you've done a lot of reporting. what in here remain askern s a what in here remain askern s c to the president's legal team? >> in terms of the attacks or dowd denying that, we have looked at that issue and gone back and reported on some of this stuff.

and the account is accurate. this is really what went on. this is what the interaction really looked like, and dowd now trying to walk away from it, this actually brings mueller to life for us. but this was a really important time in march between the special counsel's office and the president's lawyers. they really realized at that point the full extent of the questions that the -- that mueller wanted to ask the president about. and dowd was trying to do everything he could to stop mueller, and as we see in this anecdote, it was confusing. >> joyce, we also have seen that the special counsel's office shared all of the areas that they wanted to talk to the president about. so if they had a practice session, i understand that's in dispute at this pour, we have all the reporters on that can clarify that. but joyce, it seems like the special counsel's office did everything in their power to disclose everything that they may possibly want to kov we are

the president. we know where we are now. the interview does not seem to be in the cards with rudy giuliani. do you think a subpoena at this point is inevitable? >> you know, the subpoena question is still an interesting one, and it probably turns more on whether mueller has the appetite to litigate that issue on appeal. but what's really remarkable here, as you point out, the prosecutor has bent over backwards to make this process accessible for the president's team. and that's what good prosecutors do. they don't play gotcha in these interviews. they let folks know what's on the table and they sit down and have an open and honest conversation with them. one reason that we may see this rapid denial from john dowd, whether he was a source or whether he wasn't a source, though, is that i'm astonished to see a law eyer for a client being on record as having told prosecutors that his client was a liar. in essence, that his client had

and would continue to commit perjury. that puts dowd's license to practice in question. it seems like a really unusual step for a defense lawyer to take, so i'm not surprised that we saw this quick denial from him. >> phil rucker, i've been on the receiving end of three bob woodward books for the president for whom i serve, they all came after 9/11, and after the wars in iraq and afghanistan were under way. and bob woodward is a lot of things, but he's also someone whose reporting is usually spot-on and proves out. what are you struck by when yo see the white house response, where they describe the accounts in your colleague's book as the product of disgruntled former employees? there are accounts about secretary mattis, about general kelly, who are both still on the job. there are accounts from people who are anything but disgruntle.

>> i think the white house is struggling to deal with how to deal with this book. it took three hours for that statement to come out, and they're not refuting the details with the one except of kelly saying he never called the president an idiot. he's quoted in bob woodward's book and he had been quoted in some previous news reports to have called the president an idiot behind his back. so with the exception of that, they're not disputing things. i'm not sure the white house has his hands on a copy of the book. as of an hour or so they did not. so they're a little caught off guard to do the damage control. it's not the same as omarosa's book or michael wolff's book because of the stature that bob woodward has and because of his reputation as being a chronicler of presidents for 40 years now. they can't so easily say he's a serial fabricator or somebody

that's pluring tblurring the li between fact and fiction. >> and mike schmidt, they seem to be caught flat footed on another story. you reported about the white house counsel spending at least 30 hours with the special counsel and investigators. this seems like another brick in that wall of facts that they're learning either from the media or just before they're reported, that the president's lawyer was pretty upfront about thinking the president, if interviewed, would perjure himself. >> yeah. the white house still does not understand the depth and breadth of what the white house counsel don mcgahn told mueller. here were two weeks since that disclosure, and the white house doesn't know everything that he said. this is sort of a theme from the dowd era, when dowd was the lawyer. they did not have a full handle on everything that was going on. as you see in woodward's book, that's stuff about how there was

no written agreement about executive privilege. there was a whole gap there during the dowd time that the president's lawyers now are trying to understand and make up. >> joyce, i missed the dowd era, but we are now in the rudy era. let me ask you about some reporting in "the new yorker." jeffrey to been reporting that rudy giuliani pointed to a little known aspect of the agreement that trump's team truck with mueller. truck with mueller >> nice little disclosure from rudy. but, again, i guess the string that runs through john dowd and rudy giuliani is one neither

claimed their client is innocent. two, both seem worried that their client has obstructed justice. and three, they both seem to admit in public statements that end up in the newspapers that their client will perjure himself. >> of course they have to fight the mueller report going public. because the information and the conclusions reached in that report will be devastating for this president, pratt president those around him and the presidency. it is very difficult to avoid the conclusion that the president deliberately committed obstruction of justice when he still addt it on twitter to recharacterize the justice department as the political arm of his presidency, rather than as an independent agency with a 200 plus year history of devotion to the rule of law. so rudy giuliani is worried with good reason. i'm not sure that his executive privilege argument will be very

availing. it doesn't seem that a criminal investigation falls within that sort of a deliberative white house sort of a process and can be excluded. so i suspect one way or another, we'll have the opportunity to read mueller's report if he writes and delivers one. >> john, i want to read another quote from phil's piece in the book. he writes -- learning of the appointment of mueller in may 2017, trump groused, everyone is trying to get me, part of a venting period that shell shocked aides compared to richard nixon's final days as president. we've made sothose comparisons. >> there's so many striking things about this book. i want to talk about bob woodward and the foreign policy stuff in here. but here's the thing, it's may of the president's first year in office when he has this

freakout. and grant it, it's may when the special counsel is appointed. but he's having an outburst of n nixonan crazed paranoia, and he's been in office four months at the point when this is happening. it's an extraordinary account, i believe basically every word in this account for reasons that we talk more about woodward. but it's just an extraordinary thing that it goes to the core of something your friend steve has said many times, victimization is so much of the core of the trump brand. so much of the core of trump's political appeal. he feels like the most victimized person on earth. so it's not surprising in some weird way, it would be may of his presidency and he would be in the state where nixon was in the final days, which woodward also chronicled, where he's looking at the portraits of lincoln and tearing up and feeling as though the world is out to get him. it took nixon six years to get

there. >> this is sort of, again, another thread that runs through donald trump's kamd candidacy as presidency, that he can never shed the idea he was the victim. nothing changed when he became president. he never became presidential. now he has this 15 months under his belt of being under investigation, he's more aggrieved than ever. >> he thrives off of being the victim. because in his world view, everyone out there is out to get him, even the people who are closest around him in the white house. when you look at these -- even these excerpts of the account in the book, these are people in the close circle. they're not distant and far away. >> they're not deep state actors. >> they're not. they're his people and he doesn't trust them and they don't trust him. you know, we were all going on

and on about omarosa's tapes. i'm much more interested in bob woodward. >> it is quite a tell. at this point, he should be freaking out. the walls are closing in. there's a lot of reasons for trump to feel as though he's in the cross hairs. but in may, if he were innocent and the special counsel was appointed, it would have been the easiest thing for a confident president to be like, whatever, we're type. special counsel, come on, i'm fine. instead he's freaking out from day one, which tells you about a consciousness of dwiguilt and h own understanding what he was in for in the months ahead, which he's gotten that and then some. >> but it isn't just his consciousness of guilt. it is the sense that the people around him, including his own lawyers who believe he is too, and they're doing everything that they can to protect that -- protect him from that. i look at dowd and i think, my gosh, what kind of an attorney

basically says to the president himself, you will not be a good witness? >> it's remarkable. mike and joyce, i would like both your thoughts on that. i heard months ago that friends and allies outside the white house were concerned that the president may have in the way that he does business, the way he operates, may have done something that would look like obstruction of justice. it seems like a new bridge now, that it's his own lawyers who have these concerns that are now increasingly public. joyce, you first. >> well, their concerns are public, and the president has done nothing but to put everything out front and center for the public to see, starting with the lester holt interview. so i don't know if we can be surprised at this point, that either folks in his outside circle or own lawyers believes that he has these problems, as well. increasingly, it's hard to escape it for more than a couple of hours. you have to put down twitter and walk away or the president will tell you all about how

interested he is in continuing to obstruct justice. >> mike schmidt, the president tweeted over the weekend something that looked to a lot of us like an escalation in his rhetoric against jeff sessions. i know you reported that's one of the flashpoints, both his tweets and his desire for jeff sessions to unrecuse himself. do you sense any uptick or anxiety in his legal team? >> of course. they obviously do not have control over his twitter feed. the thing about his tweets that i don't understand, the tweets are being looked at by mueller. there are questions that mueller would hike like to ask the ques about on the tweets, why did he say certain things about comey or mccabe, to find out was the president trying to use his power and influence to impact the investigation? so the thing that strikes me and people around the president, people that are connected to the investigation, why does he continue to tweet about the investigation and particularly

this weekend, tweeting in a way that essentially raises questions about the way that the justice department is run, and the independence it has, in a way he had not done before. >> red lines everywhere. after the break, defense secretary mattis goes there, telling the commander in chief that his concern is avoiding world war iii. more on that blockbuster new reporting from bob woodward. also ahead, remember idiot gate? that is when chief of staff john kelly reportedly called the president an idiot. donald trump may miss those days. new details about what the president's staff thinks of him. and a brand new twist on the question, why do they stay? the most senior advisers of the president that steal documents to prevent him from endangering national security. this is not a joke. stay with us. onal security. this is not a joke stay with us ♪ a wealth of information.

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we didn't think the insults president trump hurled at jeff sessions could get much worse, but if one thing president trump has proven is that it can always get worse. from bob woodward's new book as reported in "the washington post" -- n "the washington post" -- >> this is the president's words for his hand picked attorney general. but this attack on jeff sessions this weekend that we've been talking about might land trump in more legal hot water. he tweeted --

>> joining us at the table now are my guests. i think that the jeff sessions' justice department is going to become the new rallying cry for democrats. he's -- does he understand that by attacking his own doj for prosecuting republicans who commit crimes is making them stronger? >> you know, i don't think he understands that, but it is. it's a rallying cry. the idea right now that democrats are running around defending jeff sessions for all the other things that have gone on in the justice department is amazing. but at the same time, it's jeff sessions between the president and bob mueller. and so i think that is part of the rallying cry. but i have to tell you, these

attacks this weekend underscore the fact that the president has not even a fifth grade appreciation for basic civics, for separation of powers, for the independence of the judiciary, for the systems that undergird the republic, and he has no regard for them at all. >> and agreed, but he also has no -- i mean, the things he said about jeff sessions were so offensive, we couldn't read them on tv. how much of a stain he is on humanity. >> what came across from the excerpts that have been reported out is just the constant cruelty of this president. it seeps into absolutely everything that he does. even if you're ideal logically opposed to him, the cruelty can't be separated from what you might stand to support. this, though, was really probably the absolute worst insult that a yankee can throw around about a southerner, speaking as a mississippi girl, i mean, i have never been a fan

of jeff sessions. i don't like his immigration policy. he's the antithesis of criminal justice reform. but picking on jeff sessions for his accent is taking it too far. >> never mind the political stupidity is criminal, this is a part of the country if he wants to campaign for, he can't insult an entire swath of americans. >> i'm not making excuses for donald trump, he's not doing it on television. here's the thing, i think his treatment of sessions has been appalling and it verges into the realms of obstruction of justice. no one should be confused, although jeff sessions is very popular, he's not a figure even now of great national import. the base, voters in texas and oklahoma, voters in oregon, they don't know who jeff sessions is. maybe they know who he is as

attorney general, but they don't know -- they don't know who the 98 senators are. trump does a lot of stuff in private that's ugly and mean and nasty. he never thought this could become public, but here we are. with this group of aides around him, all of whom are incredibly leaky and willing to talk to reporters of high esteem, low esteem, middle esteem, anybody. they leak more than anybody else we've seen before. there's nothing he can say in private that won't find its way to the public. >> he hasn't said anything about bad about judge kavanaugh. >> so far. >> we'll dip back into that and see what's happening there. he's sitting down to be sworn in. i think we're going to hear him talk in just a minute. let's listen. >> -- will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you god?

>> i do. >> thank you. proceed with your statement or anything else that you want to tell the committee right now. >> thank you, mr. chairman, senator feinstein, members of the committee. i thank secretary rice, senator portman and lisa blat for their generous introductions. they are patriots who represent the best of america. i'm humbled by their confidence. i'm proud to call each of them a friend. over the past eight weeks, i've witnessed first hand the senate's deep appreciation for the vital role of the american judiciary. i have met with 65 senators, including almost every member of this committee. those meetings are sometimes referred to as courtesy calls.

but that term understates how substantive and personal our discussions have been. i have greatly enjoyed all 65 meetings. in listening to all of you, i have learned more about our country and the people you represent. every senator is devoted to public service and the public good. and i thank all of the senators for their time and their thoughts. i thank president trump for the honor of this nomination. as a judge and a citizen, i was deeply impressed by the president's careful attention to the nomination process, and by his thorough consideration of potential nominees. i'm also very grateful for his courtesy that the white house, on the night of the announcement, the president and mrs. trump, were very gray

shouse -- gracious to my wife, my daughters, and my parents. my family will always cherish that night. or as my daughter liza calls it, her debut on national television. [ laughter ] as a nominee to the supreme court, i understand the responsibility i bear. some 30 years ago, judge anthony kennedy sat in this seat. he became one of the most consequential justices in american history. i served as his law clerk in 1993. . to me, justice kennedy is a mentor, a friend, and a hero. as a member of the court, he was a model of civility and clehe fiercely defended the independence of the judiciary. and he was a champion of liberty.

if you had to sum up justice kennedy's entire career in one word, liberty. justice kennedy established a legacy of liberty for ourselves and our posterity. i'm here today with another of my judicial heroes. my mom. 50 years ago this week, in september 1968, my mom was 26 and i was 3. at that time, my mom started as a public schoolteacher at mckinley tech high school here in washington, d.c. 1968 was a difficult time for race relations in our city and our country. mckinley tech had an almost entirely african-american student body. it was east of the park. i vividly remember days as a young boy sitting in the back of my mom's classroom as she taught

american history to a class of african-american teenagers. her students were born before brown versus board of education or bowling versus sharp. my her example, my mom taught me the importance of equality for all americans. equal rights, equal dignity, and equal justice under the law. my mom was a trailblazer. when i was 10, she went to law school at american university and became a prosecutor. i am an only child, and my introduction to law came at our dinner table when she practiced her closing arguments on my dad and me. her trademark line was, use your common sense. what rings true, what rings false? one of the few women prosecutors at the time, she overcame barriers and was later appointed by democratic governors to serve as a maryland state trial judge.

our federal and state trial judges serve on the front lines of american justice. my mom taught me that judges don't deal in abstract principles. they decide for real cases, for real people, in the real world. and she taught me that good judges must always stand in the shoes of others. the chairman referred to me today as judge kavanaugh. but to me, that title will always belong to my mom. for 12 years, i've been a judge on the u.s. court of appeals for the d.c. circuit. i have written more than 300 opinions and handled more than 2,000 cases. i have given it my all in every case. i am proud of that body of work, and i stand behind it. i tell people don't read about my judicial opinions, read the opinions.

i've served with 17 other judges, each of them a colleague and a friend. on a court now led by our superb chief judge, marek garland. my judicial philosophy is straightforward, a judge must be independent and must interpret the law, not make the law. a judge must interpret statutes as written. a judge must interpret the constitution as written, informed by history and tradition, and precedent. in deciding cases, a just must always keep in mind what alexander hamilton said in federalist 83, the rules of legal interpretation are rules of common sense. a good judge must be an umpire, a neutral and impartial arbiter who favors no litigant or policy. as justice kennedy explained in

texas versus johnson, one of his greatest opinions, judges do not make decisions to reach a preferred result. judges make decisions because the law and the constitution as we see them compel the results. over the past 12 years, i've ruled sometimes for the prosecution and sometimes for criminal defendants. sometimes for workers, and sometimes for businesses. sometimes for environmentalists, and sometimes for coal miners. in each case, i've followed the law. i do not decide cases based on personal or policy preferences. i'm not a pro plaintiff or pro defendant judge. i'm not a pro prosecution or pro defense judge. i am a pro law judge. as justice kennedy showed us, a judge must be independent, not

swayed by public pressure. our independent judiciary is the crown july of our constitutional republic. in our independent judiciary, the supreme court is the last line of defense for the separation of powers. and for the rights and liberties guaranteed by the constitution. the supreme court must never, never be viewed as a partisan institution. the justices on the supreme court do not sit on opposite sides of an aisle. they do not caucus in separate rooms. if confirmed to the supreme court, i would be part of a team of nine, committed to deciding cases according to the constitution and laws of the united states. i would always strive to be a team player on the team of nine.

throughout my life i've tried to serve the common good in keeping with my jesuit high school's moll motto, men for others. i have tutored at a high school for boys for low income families. at catholic charities, i've served meals to the homeless. and those works, i keep in mind the message of matthew 25, and try to serve the least fortunate among us. i know i fall short at times, but i always want to do more and do better. for the past seven years, i've coached my daughter's basketball teams. i love coaching. all the girls i've coached are awesome. and special congratulations to the girls on this year's sixth grade cyo championship team.

anna quinn, kelsey, shawnee, chloe, alex, ava, sophia, and margaret. i love helping the girls grow into confident players. i know that confidence on the basketball court tratranslates o confidence in other aspects of life. title nine helped make girls and women's sports equal. and i see that law's legacy every night when i walk into my house as my daughters are getting back from lacrosse or basketball or hockey practice. i know from my own life that those who teach and coach america's youth are among the most influential people in our country. with a kind word here and a hint of encouragement there, a word of discipline delivered in a spirit of love, teachers and coaches change lives.

i thank all of my teachers and coaches who have gotten me to this point, and i thank all the teaches and coaches throughout america. as a judge, i've sought to train the next generation of lawyers and leaders. for 12 years, i've taught constitutional law to hundreds of students, primarily at harvard law school. i teach that the constitution separation of powers protects individual liberty. i'm grateful to all my students. i have learned so much from them. and i'm especially grateful to the dean who first hired me, now justice elena kagan. one of the best parts of my job as a judge is each year hiring four recent law school graduates to serve as my law clerks for the year. i hired the best. my law clerk's come from diverse back grounds and points of view.

a majority of my 48 law clerks have been women. more than a quarter of my law clerks have been minorities. and i've had far more african-american law clerks than the percentage of african-american students in u.s. law schools. u.s. law scho. i am proud of all my law clerks. i am grateful for my friends. this past may i delivered the commentme commencement address. i said cherish your friends, look out for your friends, lift up your friends, love your friends. over the last 8 weeks i have been strengthened by the love of my friends and i thank all my friends. i am grateful to have my family behind me. my mom rightly gets a lot of

attention, but a few words about my dad. he has an unparalleled work ethic and gift for making friends with people, regardless who they are or where they come from. my dad and i are both passionate sports fans. when i was seven, he took me to the 1972 nfc championship game at rfk stadium just two miles from here. upper deck, section 503, row 3, seats 8 and 9. when i was 17, we sat in the same seats for the 1982 nfc championship game. in 1995 when i was 30, we are at camden yards together when cal ripken plated his 2131st game and broke liou ger ig's record.

my daughters, margaret and liza will be in and out of the hearing room the next few days. they're strong girls, dedicated students, outstanding athletes. in the time since you last saw them at the white house ceremony, pleased to report margaret has gotten her braces off and has turned 13. margaret is the sweetest girl you'll ever know. as for liza i tell her every night that no one gives a better hug than liza kavanaugh. finally, i thank my wife ashley. she's a strong west texan. a graduate of abilene cooper public high school, and university of texas at austin. she's now the popular town manager of our local community.

this is not exactly been the summer she had planned for the family. i am grateful for her love and inspiration. ashley is a kind soul. she always sees the goodness in others. she's made me a better person and a better judge. i thank god every day for my family. mr. chairman, senator feinstein, members of the committee, i look forward to the rest of the hearing and to answering your questions. i am an optimist. i live on the sunrise side of the mountain, not the sunset side of the mountain. i see the day that is coming, not the day that has gone. i am optimistic about the future of america. i am optimistic about the future of our independent judiciary.

i revere the constitution. if confirmed to the supreme court, i will keep an open mind in every case. i will do equal right to the poor and to the rich. i will always strive to preserve the constitution of the united states and the american rule of law. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, judge kavanaugh. >> that was judge brett kavanaugh, and donald trump tweeted during that statement the brett kavanaugh hearings for the future justice of the supreme court are truly a display of how mean, angry and despicable the other side is, they will say anything and are only looking to inflict pain and embarrassment to one of the most highly renowned jurists. seemed like a moment he could have simply talked about the

power of the ability to reshape the court or judge kavanaugh's performance, instead he had to get mean, ugly, angry. >> look, it's certainly very trump to go to the visceral reaction instead of sing judge kavanaugh's praises. >> just while he is talking. >> this is a deep political fight we saw today. democrats are heartened by what they saw, they believe the most important first thing to do is make sure no democrats defect and that the sign of energy and resistance at the beginning of the hearing, again speaking from democratic strategists involved, we saw energy, resistance, making it harder for democrats to defect. we have to first do that, then we have to move around, pick off murkowski and collins basically. they feel like they've had a good day. trump will naturally seize on the notion that democrats, because this is one of his

talking points, he is probably going to get kavanaugh and wants to go on the campaign trail and wants to say if it wasn't for me and republicans, you wouldn't have brett kavanaugh. you saw how democrats behave. they both want the us versus them fight. that's often how it is. this one because the stakes are so high and because donald trump is in the middle of it. >> do you think democrats made the right arguments and made them forcefully and early enough? >> look, i don't think the democrats have enough tools in the tool box to take down this nomination. i think they're trying and using everything they can and i think today really was about saying you know what, judge kavanaugh, if you want to go through the process, open up your records. don't dump 42,000 pages of documents on us the day before on a labor day evening before you're set to begin the hearing. i think if judge kavanaugh wanted to enter onto the bench in the most responsible way, he

would be the one saying my record should be open. i am transparent. ask me any questions. and that's not what's happening now, so it allows democrats to say what are you hiding. what is the white house hiding about judge kavanaugh that should be on the record. >> and it seems like it is a mistake to examine anything donald trump does in a narrow manner. donald trump is sitting there watching cable coverage of the woodward book, reading about secretary mattis basically thinking he is a moron. kelly had to put out a second statement, a 15 month presidency saying i did not say he was an idiot out loud. i think it is assumed he thinks he is an idiot. the idea that he is stewing, what is arguably the most lasting thing a president does is appoint supreme court justices is so trumpian. >> i still can't believe that donald trump appointed such a sane, reasonable judge like justice kavanaugh. it actually for all of the

opposition on the left to judge kavanaugh, this is honest to god of all of the candidates put forward the best case scenario for a jurist who is going to uphold the law and is going to stick to a strict interpretation. you look at donald trump, he was never that invested in the supreme court, he doesn't understand it, doesn't understand the law. he said give me federal society, give me your picks, i'll do it, essentially outsourced it to the federalist society so this isn't that important to him. >> when the live coverage ends today, he will go back to washington, analysis of the woodward book and will read most of the national security folks or people with a hand in national security really have tried to function as guardrails. gary cohen, pulling documents off his desk that would have blown up the trade pack with south korea when we were in fraught negotiations north

korea. gary cohen trying to sometimege nafta. take us back to what's perhaps the bigger story, that people closest to the president that see him up close are deeply concerned about his conduct in office. >> and not just gary cohen, it is jim mattis, general dunford, chairman of joint chiefs of staff and others who again and again and again in woodward's book are rattled by the president's lack of basic knowledge about foreign affairs and lack of curiosity in understanding how the world works, how america interfaces with its allies. there's a striking scene in woodward's book from a national security meeting about the north korean nuclear threat, and the folks around the room, national security team sort of explained to the president that the u.s. position on the korean peninsula, how much military commitment is there, how many resources we're spending, and the president questions why

we're there at all. why does america have a presence on the korean peninsula, it costs too much money, and mattis has to explain because we are trying to prevent world war three. >> mattis has to explain why john mccain is not a coward to donald trump. it is all in the woodward book. i am going to run bookstore to bookstore to try to find one. thank you all. mtp daily starts now. hi, chuck. >> hi, nicole, if you get a copy before 6:00 p.m., just saying. will you come on? >> i will read it for a little bit and drop it off. >> that would be great. if it is tuesday, well, we have an incredibly damning look inside the trump white house. good evening, i am chuck todd. we begin with breaking news.