Donald Trump blinks on Brett Kavanaugh

| 4:37 pm EDT September 17, 2018
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Even as various Republican Senators have spent the day inching away from Supreme Court nominee and alleged attempted rapist Brett Kavanaugh, the White House has sent one signal after another that Donald Trump still fully supports Kavanaugh’s nomination. However, when Trump appeared in front of the cameras today for an unrelated event, he was predictably asked about the matter, and suffice it to say that he blinked.

Donald Trump said this to the cameras today: “I’d like to see a complete process. I’d like everybody to be very happy. Most importantly I want the American people to be happy, because they’re getting somebody that is great. I want him to go in at the absolute highest level, and I think to do that, you have to go through this. If it takes a little delay, it’ll take a little delay. It shouldn’t certainly be very much.” And there it is.

Up to now, Trump and the GOP have been trying to ram the Brett Kavanaugh nomination through as quickly as possible, in the apparent hope of getting it done before his scandals could surface, or before public momentum could build against him due to his scandals. But with Dr. Christine Blasey Ford now signaling that she wants to testify against Kavanaugh, and with various Republican Senators now either saying that they want to hear that testimony or that they think this week’s committee vote should be delayed, Trump has now found himself backed into a corner.

It’s not clear precisely why Donald Trump has blinked. Anyone from the Republican Senators who are shaky on Brett Kavanaugh, to the GOP leadership, to Kavanaugh himself, could have privately told him today that the nomination is going to die if it isn’t delayed. But now that Trump has signed off on a delay, he’s playing into the hands of the Democrats, whose strategy has centered around dragging this process out so Kavanaugh’s scandals can all be fleshed out, making him radioactive.