Oct. 4 (UPI) — Sen. Chuck Grassley filed cloture on Brett Kavanaugh‘s nomination to the Supreme Court, as senators prepare to view the results of the FBI’s supplemental background investigation into Kavanaugh Thursday morning.
Grassley, an Iowa Republican and chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, announced the filing on Wednesday night, setting up for a procedural vote Friday that may lead to a vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation.
He added there will be “plenty of time” before the vote for members of the judiciary committee to be briefed on the supplemental material from the investigation that was ordered in response to allegations of sexual assault against brought forward by Christine Blasey Ford.
All 100 Senators will have access to the “302” forms of the FBI interviews, beginning with , R-Iowa, at 8:00 a.m., followed by ranking Democratic member Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who will be able to read the file beginning at 9:00 a.m., NBC News reported.
Republican members of the Judiciary Committee will be permitted to view the file at 10:00 a.m. and Democrats will be able to view it at 11:00 a.m., with all other senators receiving an opportunity afterward.
Only one copy of the file will be provided for the senators to share amongst themselves and if all 100 senators choose to review the document individually for at least 30 minutes each it could take at least 50 hours to complete the examination.
“Get this — one copy! For the United States Senate,” said Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin. “That’s what we were told. And we were also that we would be given one hour for the Dems, one hour for the Republicans. Alternating.”
“Do the math,” Durbin added. “That’s a lot of time.”
Republican aides said the process of alternating a single copy of an FBI report between Republicans and Democrats is usual practice for judicial nominees and Judiciary Committee Republicans a 2009 memorandum of understanding, which stated that reproducing FBI background reports is prohibited.
A Gallup poll released Wednesday showed Americans remain closely divided on Kavanaugh’s confirmation, with 46 percent in favor 45 percent opposed and 9 percent having no opinion.
The poll also showed the largest gap in approval for a Supreme Court nominee Gallup had measured to date, as 84 percent of Republicans were in favor of Kavanaugh’s confirmation as opposed to 13 percent of Democrats.
Independents were closely split with 46 percent opposing Kavanaugh’s confirmation and 43 percent approving.
The poll was based on telephone interviews with a random sample of 1,462 adults, conducted from Sept. 24 to Sept. 30 –after Kavanaugh and Ford testified before the Senate about the sexual assault allegations — and featured a 3 percent margin of error at 95 percent confidence level.
