short. >> elise jordan, lisa green and sam seder, thank you all for being with me on this remarkable day. that does it all for us at "all in" this evening. that went by very quickly. "the rachel maddow show" starts right now. good evening, rachel. good evening, chris. i feel like time has lost all meaning at this point. what an amaze daig in the news. thanks, my friend. and thanks to you at home for joining us this hour. all right. as chris said, time has lost meaning. things are going both faster and slower than it seems they out to. but today is a historic day for a million different reasons, and let's try to make some sense of it together. i want to start tonight with some of what we saw today with the way i think today went and what was just this sprawling, gut-wrenching emotional hearing. after we talk about sort of what i think happened today, we're going to talk a little bit about what's going to happen because of this hearing today, where this is all likely to go. but in terms of -- in terms of what happened today, this is all out of chronological order,

because i'm just trying to make the most sense of it. i think when you talk about the impact of what happened today, even without us know wlag this is going to do to the kavanaugh confirmation, i think you have to start with this. nobody has ever been confirmed to the federal judiciary in the united states after anything even close to this happened in the u.s. senate while that nominee was being assessed for the job. >> my family and my name have been totally and permanently destroyed by vicious and false seditional accusations. you have replaced advice and consent with search and destroy. since my nomination in july, there has been a frenzy on the left to come up with something, anything to block my confirmation. people have been willing to do anything to make any physical threat against my family, to

send any violent e-mail to my wife, to make any kind of allegation against me and against my friends, to blow me up and take me down. you sowed the wind for decades to come i fear that the whole country will reap the whirlwind. the behavior of several of the democratic members of this committee at my hearing a few weeks ago was an embarrassment, but at least it was just a good old-fashioned attempt at borking. at least those efforts didn't work when i did at least okay enough at the hearing that it looked like i might actually get confirmed, a new tactic was needed. some of you were lying in wait and had it ready. a long series of false last-minute smears designed to scare me and drive me out of the process. before any hearing occurred. you've tried hard.

you've given it your all. no one can question your effort. with your coordinated and well funded effort to destroy my good name and destroy my family will not drive me out. this whole two-week effort has been a calk lated and orchestrated political hit fueled with a parent pent up anger about president trump and the 2016 election, fear that has been unfairly stoked about my judicial record, revenge on behalf of the clintons. >> revenge on behalf -- supreme court nominee brett kavanaugh isn't on the supreme court at this point, but he is already a federal appeals court judge. a federal appeals court judge behaving that way, speaking that way in any setting let alone in the senate, yelling like this at u.s. senators, aside from

everything else that happened today, this is just unheard of for a sitting jurist. >> if you're very confident of your position and you appear to be, why aren't you also asking the fbi to investigate these claims? >> senator, i'll do whatever the committee wants. i wanted a hearing the day after the allegation came up. i wanted to be here that day. instead, ten days passed where all this nonsense is coming out, you know, that i'm in gangs, i'm on boats in rhode island, i'm colorado, i'm sighted all over the place, and these things are printed and run breathlessly by cable news. you know, i wanted a hearing the next day. my family's been destroyed by this, senator. destroyed. >> and -- >> whatever the committee decides, i'm all in,

immediately. i'm all in immediately. i'm here. i wanted to be here -- i wanted to be here the next day. it's an outrage that i was not allowed to come and immediately defend my name and say i didn't do this and give you all this evidence. i'm not even -- i'm not even in d.c. on the weekends in the summer of 1982. this happened on a weekday? when i'm not at a blair high school for a game, i'm not at tobin's house working out, i'm not at a movie with suzanne? you know, i wanted to be here right away. >> we hear from the witnesses, but the fbi isn't interviewing them and isn't giving us any fax. so all we have -- >> you're interviewing mement you're interviewing me. you're doing it, senator. >> what you're saying, if i understand it, is that the allegations by dr. ford, ms.

ramirez, and ms. swetnick are wrong. >> that is emphatically what i'm saying, emphatically. the swetnick thing is a joke that is a farce. welcome, you like to say more about it? >> no. >> okay. >> that's it. thank you, mr. chairman. >> ms. mitchell? >> dr. ford has described you as being intoxicated at a party. >> judge kavanaugh seemed to be sort of unable to control himself for some of his hearing this afternoon. and you heard the start of the questioning there that came after. after that interaction with dianne feinstein, screaming at senator feinstein, not really getting her questions and he is sort of interrupting, rung off on tangents and we don't really know where they're going. he then seems to get mikd up or sort of stuck answering

questions questions about drinking. and it's hard to tell watching this part of the hearing, watching him talk about drinking during this part of the hearing if judge kavanaugh was finding those particular question just too difficult to answer, or if they weren't necessarily hard questions, but he was just finding it too hard to contain himself, finding it so difficult to contain his emotions that he just couldn't get his answers out. >> i drank beer with my friends. almost everyone did. sometimes i had too many beers. sometimes others did. i liked beer. i still like beer. we drank beer, my friends and i, boys and girls, yes. we drank beer, liked beer. i still like beer. we drank beer. like beer. >> do you relate to alcohol? >> i like beer. i don't know, do you like beer, senator? what do you like to drink? >> next one -- >> what do you like?

wlarks >> what do you consider to be too many beers? >> i don't know. whatever the chart says, blood alcohol chart. >> so drinking came up repeatedly today for a couple of reasons. number one, because dr. christine blasey ford's claim that she was sexually assaulted by brett kavanaugh when he was 17 is an allegation that she says happened while kavanaugh, in her words, was stumbling drunk. so that's one reason why drinking has come up around this confirmation. the other reason drinking came up repeatedly today at this layering in particular is because since this sexual assault allegation against him as surfaced, judge kavanaugh has claimed in testimony that has been included in the congressional record, and it was therefore subjected to pain of perjury, he has claimed that he has never once in his entire life drunk to excess, to the point where he couldn't remember something that happened while he was drunk. and that has become a source of controversy in his confirmation because it has been contested by kavanaugh's friends from the time period in question.

they say he was known as a heavy drinker, and that's not the end of the world, but if he is lying about that, there is a question of why he is lying about that. the issue with drinking also led to some of the most baffled, disjoint even strange responses from brett kavanaugh today, including him not answering questions from senator amy klobuchar and him sort of culminating that exchange with a series of aggressive questions to her where he appeared to be insinuating that she had a drinking problem. >> most people have done some drinking in high school and college, and many people even struggle with alcoholism and binge drinking. my own dad struggled with alcoholism most of his life, and he got in trouble for it and there were consequences. he is still in aa at age 90, and he is sober, and in his words, he was pursued by grace, and that's how he got through this. so in your case, you have said

here and other places that you never drank so much that you didn't remember what happened, but yet we have heard, not under oath, but we have heard your college roommate say that you did drink frequently. these are in news reports, that you would sometimes be belligerent. another classmate said it's not credible for you to say you didn't have memory lapses. so drinking is one thing. >> i actually don't think that's the second quote is correct. >> okay. drinking is one thing, but the concern is about truthfulness. and in your written testimony, you said sometimes you had too many drinks. was there ever a time when you drank so much that you couldn't remember what happened or part of what happened the night before? >> no. i remember what happened, and i think you've probably had beers senator. >> so you're saying there has never been a case where you drank so much that you didn't remember what happened the night

before or part of what happened? >> you're asking about blackout. i don't know. have you? >> could you answer the question, judge? that's not happened? is that your answer? >> yeah, and i'm curious if you have. >> i have no drinking problem, judge. >> nor do i. >> okay, thank you. >> judge kavanaugh actually came back from a break after that moment and apologized for what he had said there to senator klobuchar. it's not clear to me why he said it and why he was going there. we'll talk with senator klobuchar than in a few minutes. if brett kavanaugh ends up on the supreme court, or if he doesn't and he just goes back to the d.c. court of appeals, not just this sexual assault allegation levied against him during his confirmation process by christine blasey ford, but also this side of brett kavanaugh that he showed today in the hearing room, this will now be a part of the history of this nomination and of his role

in history and his role as a judge. even if he steines d.c. appeals court, but especially if he goes the supreme court, kavanaugh's behavior today in this public hearing will change the modern perception of the court. in an indelible way, it will change the expectations for what judges are supposed to be like. now in terms of assessing the sexual assault allegation against brett kavanaugh, which was the cause of today's hearing, there was a pretty tight range in terms of things that were actually fought over in the committee room. one of them that was fought over and over again, and it's still unanswered is the question of why republicans and the white house and judge kavanaugh now are so insistent that the fbi must not be allowed to reopen their background investigation of kavanaugh to gather statements about these allegations against him that have arisen during the course of his nomination. republicans today tried a dual track of arguing both that the fbi background check process is no big deal, it wouldn't provide

anything helpful anyway, and at the same time that. >> insisted today that it's very important that this pointless little nothing fbi investigation definitely shouldn't be done in this case. even though this is the way it's always been done for all other nominees. in the clarence thomas/anita hill matter, in the john tower defense nomination. whenever there have been late-raised allegations in a confirmation process, and that is a nominee for whom there is a background investigation, the background investigation gets reopened. they insist that must not happen here. and newly today that the fbi investigation is no big deal. it's hard to argue both of those simultaneously. judge kavanaugh himself, though, hewed close to those republican arguments today, to the point of bewilderment from one democratic senator. >> i am sure that the chairman at that point will understand that that is a reasonable request to finally put to rest these charges if they are false or to prove them if they are

not. you spent two years in a white house office that approved judicial nominees. you turned to the fbi over and over and over again for their work. let's bring them in here and now. turn to don mcgahn and tell him it's time to get this done. an fbi investigation the only way to answer some of these questions. stop the clock. >> this committee is running this hearing, not the white house, not don mcgahn, not even you as a nominee. we are here today because dr. ford asked for an opportunity to hear. >> i welcome whatever the committee wants to do because i'm telling the truth. >> i want to know what you want to do. >> i'm telling the truth. i'm innocent. i'm innocent of this charge. >> then you're prepared for an investigation. >> they don't reach conclusions. you reach the conclusions, senator. >> no they do investigate questions. and you can't visit both ways,

judge you. can't say here at the beginning i welcome any kind of investigation -- >> this thing was sprung on me. this thing was sprung at the last minute after being held by staff, you know. >> judge? >> and i call for a hearing immediately. >> why would you resist that kind of investigation? whoo nguyen would you resist that kind of investigation? >> senator, i welcome -- i wanted the hearing last week. >> i'm asking about the fbi investigation. >> the committee figures out how to ask the questions. i'll do whatever. i've been on the phone multiple times with the committee counsel. >> judge kavanaugh will, you support an fbi investigation right now? >>ly do whatever the committee wants -- >> personally, do you think that's the best thing for us to do? you won't answer? >> look, senator, i have said i wanted a hearing, and i said i would welcome anything, i'm innocent.

>> immediately after that sort of collapse on the issue of why the fbi can't look into this, it was immediately after that that republicans actually abandoned their whole game plan for how this hearing was going to go today. if you remember if you saw anything in the morning session with dr. christine blasey ford, republicans sat silently through the entire morning. they ceded all of their time to ask questions to a sex crimes prosecutor they had flown in for this occasion from arizona. in the afternoon session, democratic senator mazie hirono actually clarified at the outsweat the republican chairman that again, like the morning. that would all cede all of their time in the afternoon to that same prosecutor, rather than saying anything themselves to judge kavanaugh. chairman grassley confirmed that was the plan for the afternoon as well, but after what just happened there with dick durbin, after kavanaugh fell apart under questioning about why there can't be an investigation of these claims against him, republicans threw that plan out

the window and republican senator lindsey graham claimed back his time that he had supposedly already given to the professional prosecutor, and he gave a big yelling speech about how this was a disaster, a terrible disaster, and republican senators must vote for brett kavanaugh. >> you've got nothing to apologize for. when you see sotomayor and kagan, tell them that lindsey said hello, because i voted for them. i would never do to them what you've done to this guy. this is the most unethical sham since i've been in politics. to my republican colleagues, if you vote no, you're legitimizing the most despicable thing i have seen in my time in politics. you want this seat? i hope you never get it. i hope you're on the supreme court. that's exactly where you should be. >> so they break format

completely. republican senators have not spoken all day long. they're having this professional prosecutor doing it instead, but senator graham claims time. he has already given up his time. he is granted time from somewhere, and senator graham has them change what they're doing and after that from senator graham, this republican prosecutor who was hired to do all of the questions of all of the witnesses today, she never spoke again. so they used the professor today to ask all of the questions of the alleged victim in this alleged sexual assault case, but they gave up after a couch of minutes with the alleged purpose of this sexual assault and later telling him he had nothing to apologize for. they then shut up the female prosecutor for whole rest of the day while the republican senators all went on one after another to spend the rest of the hearing making speeches on his behalf until the hearing ended. so that was the point that was the moment at which they the

republicans seemed to think that things were going so badly for this nomination that. >> needed to pull the fire alarm. they needed to do something, and they did. the whole rest are of the hearing was angry war cry speeches from male republican senators interspersed with democrats asking judge kavanaugh questions and him not answering. and i'm sure republicans like the feeling of how it ended much more than the way it began. but they head home tonight, or we're told they head into a big republican senators meeting tonight with some new new big problems when it come this nominee. number one, there is a brand-new temperament issue with judge kavanaugh that had not previously been an issue for him. him yelling how how this is all revenge on behalf of the clintons that was him letting the mask slip a little bit about the kind of partisan warrior he was for his whole adult career before getting on to the bench. it's part of why it took them years to confirm him to the bench in the first place more than ten years ago. it's why his initial nomination from the george bush

administration was so confidential. that has largely been absent from this debate over his supreme court nomination, before now. but now that issue will very much be live, and it will be controversial for him as long as he is a judge, even if he only goes back to his old judgeship and he does not ascend to the supreme court. they will also be newly contending with credibility issues with judge kavanaugh. on other matters where they said he was misleading, newly because of today they're going to be dealing with issues around judge kavanaugh in the way that tends to stick in the public's mind, which is when you're not credible on stuff that's small, when you say things that are plainly not true just to make yourself look better or the get out of a jam or to not have to answer a bad question, not necessarily on the big stuff, but on the small stuff, the

small obviously disprovable stuff. judge kavanaugh today told senator sheldon whitehouse that yes, when he wrote as a teenager about being the president of the beach week ralph club, yes, that was a reference to throwing up. but then he apparently thought better of it and said the throwing up in question here, the reason he would be barfing at beach week, the ralph club in question is probably because of his weak stomach, because he can't take spicy food. and who cares, right? unless that's violently at odds with the obvious small truth here. and with common sense. judge kavanaugh also explaining today in his opening statement that when he and a bunch of his football buddies all listed themselves throughout their high school yearbook as, quote, alumni of a girl from a nearby school, a girl who they said if you were late, don't hesitate, call her to get a date. they're all calling themselves

alumni of her name. he said today that was a sign of admiration for her, their collective admiration for her and how much they considered her to be, in his words, one of us. whether or not his attitude toward women and girls at that time in his life is going to be seen as relevant to the sexual assault allegation from that time that he is now facing, what's more immediately wrong with that today is he is trying to get on to the supreme court is that that is just an obvious small self-serving lie. that's the kind of cowardly lie about an obviously true thing that makes you seem not credible on anything. a sign of admiration showing her that she -- for what it's worth, the woman in question who was the subject of this sneering alumni thing from kavanaugh and his friends, she didn't take it as a sign of admiration or a sign that all those football players thought that she was one of them. she said this week, quote, the insinuation is horrible, hurtful and simply untrue. i pray their daughters are never treated this way.

so there is temperament problems. there is small scale credibility problems, which are sometimes the worst ones there are the kinds that tend to stick, right, once people think you're super comfortable lying about even the small stuff. but then there is the big factual problems that were raised today around this sexual assault allegation. one was the clarification today in dr. christine blasey ford's testimony about when this allegation was made, specifically, when she tried to raise the alarm about brett kavanaugh and what she says was her experience with him, she says she tried to raise the alarm, in fact, she showed today, she confirmed the timeline today that she tried to raise the alarm about this incident before he was named to the supreme court. the spark for her to act, the spark for her to notify her member of congress about what happened between her and brett kavanaugh, to try to notify the press, even though she want herd name left out of it in both

instance, the catalyst for her giving her story to congress to let the country know this happened about brett kavanaugh, the catalyst was him being named as part of the short list of presidential contenders for the united states supreme court. >> this changed in early july 2018. i saw a press report stating that brett kavanaugh was on the short list of a list of very well qualified supreme court nominees. i thought it was my civic duty to relay the information i had about mr. kavanaugh's conduct so that those considering his nomination would know about this assault. on july 6th, i had a sense of urgency to relay the information to the senate and the president as soon as possible before a nominee was selected. i did not know how specifically to do this. i called my congressional representative and let her

receptionist know that someone on the president's short list had attacked me. i also sent a message to the encrypted "washington post" confidential tip line. i did not use my name, but i provided the names of brett kavanaugh and mark judge. i stated that mr. kavanaugh had assaulted me in the 1980s in maryland. >> if you were watching this in realtime today, that may have just kind of seemed like laying this out, what the order here was, right? super important. this clarification of the timeline, and it was actually born out by evidence that was put forth today in the hear, including any prosecutor who the republicans hired, this isn't just a detail here, this isn't just like getting the facts down so we can all talk about this. this is actually totally critical because kavanaugh's defense and republican senators' defense of kavanaugh today, this angry chest-pounding defense that they put on today that he and all the republican senators decided to go with was about the

timing of the allegation. >> this whole two-week effort has been a calculated and orchestrated political hit fueled with apparent pent-up anger about president trump and the 2016 election. >> no. no, actually. and not just as a point of argument, but as a point of fact, we now know, attested to by both sides that christine blasey ford came forward about brett kavanaugh when she found out brett kavanaugh was on the short list for the call. she made her call. she started trying to alert the congress about this alleged assault by brett kavanaugh before he was picked for the supreme court. she was trying to get them to not pick him for the supreme court. if she had been motivated just to stop a trump supreme court nomination, if this is something she was doing because she was fueled by pent up anger about president trump in the 2016

election, if she was just trying to stop a trump supreme court nominati nomination, she was willing to make up a false allegation about the trump nominee in order to do that, she would have had to wait until a nominee was picked. before she came forward with her story than nominee. she proved today with evidence cited by the republicans' hired prosecutor that she emphatically did not wait to find out who the nominee was for the supreme court seat. she jumped in and tried to raise the alarm about kavanaugh because she had had this experience specifically with kavanaugh, and she wanted to raise the alarm just in case he might seriously be under consideration. that is a big factual problem for the defense that was raised for kavanaugh today. right? they said this was a made-up story they would have used against any nominee. no. she came forward about brett kavanaugh before he was the nominee. had the president picked somebody else off the short list, it's not like her

allegation would have morphed to suddenly become about somebody else. her allegation was about brett kavanaugh under the prospect that he might be named. that is a problem for the kavanaugh defense, that this is all some hit job designed to take out whoever was going to be trump's nominee. that's a problem, a factual, factual problem, as is the other one i'm going tell you about next. we'll be right back. we'll be rhtig back. - [announcer] the typical vacuum head can struggle with large debris and stuck-on dust, so shark invented duoclean, replacing the front wall with a rotating soft brush. while deep cleaning carpets, two brush rolls pick up large particles with ease, make quick work of stuck-on dust, giving hard floors a polished look, and fearlessly devour piles. shark duoclean technology, designed to do more on carpets and floors, available in corded and cord-free vacuums, and only available from shark.

at the end of the hearing today, judge brett kavanaugh told senator kamala harris of california that he had not watched the testimony today from dr. christine blasey ford. he didn't watch what she had to say. he should have watched her testimony. note like as a matter of, you know, decency or respect or whatever, but he simply should have watched her testimony, because had he watched her testimony, he would have seen that in her testimony there was raised a serious problem, a real

problem with the one piece of evidence he cited over and over and over again in his testimony as the most important and best evidence he had in his own defense against the sexual assault allegation that he denied today. it was his repeated reliance today on a witness statement, a witness statement from a woman who had been friends with dr. ford, who dr. ford said was at the party where the alleged assault happened. in a witness statement filed by this woman's attorney, her attorney said that she didn't recall crossing paths with brett kavanaugh and she didn't recall anything about the alleged party. judge kavanaugh relied on that witness today today more than any other single thing. that's his best evidence. that's what he's citing as his proof that he couldn't have committed this sexual assault because he wasn't there. this event didn't happen. the problem with judge kavanaugh's reliance on that one statement as the primary piece of evidence he had to support his denial is had he watched dr.

christine blasey ford's testimony today, which he says he did not, he would have seen that one witness statement in particular sharply called into question. >> here that's quote from ms. keisskie keyser's attorney's letter. quote, ms. keyser does not more o know mr. kavanaugh and has no recollection of being at a party or gathering with or without dr. ford. listen to ms. keyser. she does not know me. i was not at the party described by dr. ford. importantly, her friend ms. keyser has not only denied knowledge of the party, ms. keyser said under penalty of felony, she does not know me, does not recall ever being at a party with me ever, dr. ford's long-time friend ms. keyser who said that she didn't know me and that she does not recall ever being at a party with me. all the witnesses present, look

at ms. keyser's statement. ms. keyser is her long-time friend, said she never saw me at a party with or without -- >> over and over and over and over again. this is the specific evidence that kavanaugh is building his defense on. it's this witness statement that he relies on again and again and again and again to prove his assertion that he definitely didn't go to this event. he didn't go do this supposed party where this alleged assault happened, handy can prove it because this person said he wasn't there. well, had he watched dr. blasey ford's testimony this morning, he would have learned that the person who made that statement which he relied on over and over again, she apparently contacted dr. ford after her attorney issued that statement. she told dr. ford directly that actually, she had not completed that statement herself at all. it is something her lawyer wrote without her input, and apologized to dr. ford for its content.

do. >> you have any particular motives to ascribe to leland? >> i guess we can take those one at a time. leland has significant health challenges, and i'm happy that she is focusing on herself and getting the health treatment that she needs and she let me know that she needed her lawyer to take care of this for her, and she texted me right afterward with an apology and good wishes, et cetera. so i'm glad she is taking care of herself. >> she apologized to dr. ford after the statement was put out in her name. she said i didn't do it. i my lawyer just did it. i wasn't involved. that's the witness statement that is the factual basis of brett kavanaugh's defense to the sexual assault charge. and it more than wobbles, right? i mean, all of the more reason why it really does matter. it's not just a process. it really does matter that republican senators won't actually allow any of these

witnesses to come forward and be questioned whether or not they have had lawyers submit statements on their behalf. but as they head toward what we are told will be a 9:30 a.m. eastern time vote in committee tomorrow on judge kavanaugh's supreme court nomination, and then a noon vote in the whole senate on saturday, there are problems in terms of what came up for judge kavanaugh at this confirmation hearing today, both in terms of his own behavior and in terms of defense. but if you watched this hearing today you know the real problem for judge kavanaugh's nomination. he might not have watched her but the country did, and that is the mountain that every one of these voting senators is going to have to climb. >> last night the republican staff of this committee released the media timeline that shows that they've interviewed two people who claimed they were the ones who actually assaulted you. i'm asking you to address this new defense of mistaken identity

directly. dr. ford, with what degree of certainty do you believe brett kavanaugh assault you'd? >> 100%. >> how are you so sure that it was he? >> the same way that i'm sure i'm talking to you right now. basic memory functions and also just the level of nor epinephrine and epinephrine in the brain that encodes memories into the hippocampus so the trauma-related experience then is kind of locked there whereas other details kind of drift. >> what is the strongest memory you have, the strongest memory of the incident? something that you cannot forget? take whatever time you need. >> indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter, the uproarious

laughter between the two and they're having fun at my expense. >> republicans chose to end the hearing today with angry speeches telling judge kavanaugh they were so sorry for him. he has nothing to apologize for. he has been victimized here worse than they could possibly imagine. judge kavanaugh told senator kamala harris at the close of questioning that he did not bother to watch dr. ford's testimony. he meant to do it. he intends to at some point, but he didn't. the country watched her, though. and that is going to be a problem for him as a supreme court nominee or even just as a judge that goes back to the d.c. appeals court. it just -- it just. >> i only have a few seconds left, and i'll just ask you a direct question. did you watch dr. ford's testimony? >> i did not.

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a fight that can only be won, if we stand together for one cause. him. expert care for every new beginning. can you tell us what you don't forget about that night? >> the stairwell, the living room, the bedroom, the bed on the right side of the room as you walk into the room. there was a bed to the right. the bathroom in close proximity. the laughter, the uproarious laughter, and the multiple

attempts to escape and the final ability to do so. >> thank you very much, dr. ford. >> dr. christine blasey ford testifying today. senator amy klobuchar of minnesota, democratic member of the judiciary committee joins us live now. senator, thanks for being was. >> thank you. >> i know this must have been an exhausting day. >> well, i just -- she was so graceful and so dignified, went through every question you could imagine, and i was just shocked by what happened actually in the afternoon. we had had a hearing where we at least got some sense of what this evidence is. of course, we still don't have the man that was in the room, mark judge, and we don't have any of the other witnesses that we've been allowed to subpoena, but in the afternoon, they just turned into it a red meat, scorched earth policy moment. they just left everything behind and decided to make it into a

political circus. and i was shocked by it, but i still think america saw this woman in the morning. they saw her credibility, and they saw her answer questions. >> there was a remarkable moment in the afternoon session where you were pressing judge kavanaugh about his credibility as far as what i could tell you were getting at in terms of the way he has talked about his past drinking, whether or not he had been honest about drinking and whether he always remembered things that had happened while he had been drinking, and there was this moment where he turned it around and started asking about you drinking in a way that you seemed to taken aback. he actually came back from a break and apologized about that. do you have any sense of what was going on there? >> i think that i was asking some tough questions. i was asking him, because he has said this isn't a he said/she said. this is a he said/they said. he has said that he has never blacked out or gotten so drunk

that he doesn't remember what happened the next day. i asked him has that ever happened or where at least you partially didn't remember what happened? because i was trying to get at how this could be that we have such different accounts. and instead of answering the question, he turned it. and he did apologize, but i don't think anyone prepares for a supreme court nominee asking you if you blacked out, but that happened to me, and i firmly told him that after he apologized that growing up with my dad who is an alcoholic, but through treatment is now sober at age 90, that you are very careful about drinking when you grow up with something like that. and so i just thought it was another moment where he wasn't answering the question, and my whole focus today was let's get that fbi investigation open again. let's do the background check. even if we had one week, rachel, one week, and they're rushing this through, it appears they have not canceled the vote for

9:30 tomorrow morning. and i think most of america watching that would have said could we just get the facts? could you get the polygraph expert that said she passed with flying colors where it's been verified? they won't even allow us to call that expert. >> watching from home, just watching on a screen, one of the things that surprised me about judge kavanaugh that i didn't expect is he seemed not just angry and aggressive, but like he was having trouble controlling himself, trouble controlling his impulses, including in that interaction with you and the subsequent apology. but when it came to the morning session and watching dr. blasey ford talk about her experience and her allegation, i wonder how'd you saw that as a former prosecutor. i know you worked on sexual assault cases. was there anything about her testimony that spoke to you about her -- her credibility in terms of what you've seen from other similar cases? >> well, there was a drawing i saw later that said whose supposed to be emotional?

she was steady. he was the one that didn't seem as steady and was more emotional. but what she was doing was basically laying out the fact that you have so well articulated during the show is that she actually has talked about this in the past. she said to it a therapist. her husband had remembered the name brett kavanaugh. she has with some detail remembered the assault. and all she's asked is that the fbi figure out when mark judge was working at the safeway when she saw him later, because that would help her get the exact date. and she has said shed li eshe'd to see it open, but she can't get the president to reoctuplet. senator grassley could reopen it. all he would have to say is we're holding the vote for a week until we get some information, like we would with any other nominee. and certainly judge kavanaugh could just make a phone call to president and get him to reopen

it. and then if his account is correct we will have the information. and i think that is the search for truth would end there. but we are not getting that investigation as far as we know as of right now at this moment in time. >> senator amy klobuchar of minnesota, thank you for being here tonight. i know that vote, at least for now is scheduled 9:30 tomorrow morning. good luck. keep us apprised. >> it is. thank you, rachel. i want to bring in the conversation now nina totenberg, a long time legal affairs correspondent for national public radio. among her many other scoops to her credit in her career is she broke the anita hill story in 1991. nina, thank you very much for joining us. it's an honor to have you here tonight. >> my pleasure. >> what's your top line reaction watching -- watching this hearing tonight? i know lots of people are drawing lots of parallels to what happened in 1991 with the anita hill story. but on its own merits and on its own terms, what did you see today as a veteran of so many of these controversies?

>> well, dr. ford was a different kind of witness than anita hill. anita hill was very calm, almost introverted. everything sort of went inward. dr. ford sort of went inward. dr. ford looked like trenulous in the beginning, but she stood her ground and what she could remember she said was the details of the attack and that it was brett kavanaugh and egged on by his friend mark judge. now, i have a thing that i do occasionally, which is i watch testimony, i turn it off the audio. not a good thing for radio. but after i've heard it the first time around and i see it being replayed i turn off the audio just to see what people look like. and she looked contained, nervous but contained and sort

of like a normal person. judge kavanaugh in contrast looked sort of wild-eyed. now, if he is falsely accused you can imagine he would feel wild-eyed, but this is man who's been a judge for 12 years, who aspires to be confirmed for a seat on the supreme court, and there is this thing called judicial temperament. and we didn't see much of that today. >> do you think that will become a problem for judge kavanaugh moving forward? obviously there's the immediate question whether or not he's going to be confirm today the high court. even if he isn't because his nomination fails or moves on he'll still go back to the d.c. court of appeals. i felt as a lay observer this was a side of the judge that nobody would want to put forward in a confirmation context. the temperament, will those be

problems for him moving forward? >> well, i would imagine given the fact that if hillary clinton espous the idea of a white ring conspiracy theory, he aspous the idea of a left wing conspiracy theory. if i were in one of those groups, a left wing group or a group that had opposed his nomination, and he apparently feels the democrats and those groups conspire asked spent millions of dollars in ads to defeat him, although i think the actual facts conservatives spent more money. they both spent plenty of money, mind you. >> with every nominee it always happens. >> but if i were in one of those groups and i had a case in front of the supreme court i might think long and hard about it, but i might move to recuse him in a conflict of interest.

>> nina totenberg, legendry reporter, class of her own. really appreciate it. we've got more to come. stay with us. e it we've got more to come stay with us -♪ he's got legs of lumber and arms of steel ♪ ♪ he eats a bowl of hammers at every meal ♪ ♪ he holds your house in the palm of his hand ♪ ♪ he's your home and auto man ♪ big jim, he's got you covered ♪ ♪ great big jim, there ain't no other ♪ -so, this is covered, right? -yes, ma'am. take care of it for you right now.

giddyup! hi! this is jamie. we need some help.

my motivation in coming forward was to be helpful and to provide facts about how mr. kavanaugh's actions have damaged my life so that you could take into a serious consideration as you make your decision about how to proceed. it is not my responsibility to determine whether mr. kavanaugh deserves to sit on the supreme court. my responsibility is to tell you the truth. >> joining us now is seong min kim, she was in the room, and thank you for being here. it's a real pleasure to have you

here. >> thanks have having me. >> you were in the room today. were you there for both the morning and afternoon sessions? >> yeah, i was. and it was striking just the different atmosphere that the morning session and the afternoon session had. clearly her -- you know, her testimony was just incredibly riveting. the senators who all were sitting up leaning forward in their chairs, they were really listening to her word, every word that was coming out of her mouth really intently. almost all the senators were on time for the hearing. that doesn't happen very often. and obviously judge kavanaugh came out very combative and defiant and then lindsey graham delivered, you know, his very angry monologue and that just unleashed this -- like all these tensions in the room. >> in terms of that turning point when senator graham decided to kind of break format, up until that opponent republican senators had not questioned either witness. they had deferred to this

outside prosecutor they brought in from arizona. senator graham kind of claimed time on the floor and gave that speech and thereafter that prosecutor never spoke again. did you know from your reporting or could you tell from the room if that was just an abandonment from the previous plan they had or was that actually a planned pivot point for them? >> it almost seemed it was organic at that point. i had sources telling me yesterday when we were doing the reporting that the plan was most if not republicans -- you can't control every republican senator, but most were going to see their time for rachel mitchell to do their questioning. and he even said to me in an interview last week he was so angry because quote, this has been a drive-by shooting for

kavanaugh since the allegations came forward. you sensed for some time graham wanted to make that statement, and i think one by one that gave the rest of the republicans kind of implicitly to say what they thought. we were wondering if his comments would give any indication of where he was lining where he would lean. but it really did want. he apologized to both judge ford -- judge kavanaugh, but he also apologized to dr. ford and talked about leaving the room there could be as much doubt as certainty. so we really don't know where his head is at night now. and he really does seem to be struggling as he talked to reporters. >> i really appreciate your time tonight. i know this was an exhausting day even just covering it.

so thanks for being up with us. >> thanks for having me. >> and as i mentioned earlier the plan is at 9:30 a.m. eastern time they are going to move ahead with a vote on judge kavanaugh's nomination on the judiciary committee. democrats had called not only for the votes to be pulled but to expand the background investigation to include these new allegations. republicans do appear to be ignoring those claims and push this nomination ahead despite what they heard today from christine blasey ford. we'll see. we do expect further developments overnight, though. i'll see you again tomorrow but right now it's time for an msnbc special report on today's hearing helmed by our own lawrence o'donnell. >> announcer: this is an msnbc special presentation. i am here today not because i want to be. i am