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Who was the woman who contacted Brett Kavanaugh?

In early July 2018, after Judge Brett Kavanaugh was reported to be on Donald Trump 's shortlist to become an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, Ford contacted both The Washington Post and her congresswoman, Anna Eshoo. On July 20, eleven days after Trump nominated Kavanaugh, Eshoo met with Ford, becoming convinced of her credibility and noting that Ford seemed "terrified" that her identity as an accuser might become public. Eshoo and Ford decided to take the matter to Senator Dianne Feinstein, one of Ford's senators in California and the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which would deliberate Kavanaugh's nomination. In a July 30, 2018 letter to Feinstein, Ford alleged that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her when both were in high school in Bethesda, Maryland, and stated that she expected her story to be kept confidential. In August that year, Ford took a polygraph test with a former FBI agent who concluded Ford was being truthful when attesting to the accuracy of her allegations.

Who is Leland Keyser?

In their 2019 book The Education of Brett Kavanaugh: An Investigation, authors Robin Pogrebin and Kate Kelly interviewed Leland Keyser, a close friend of Ford's from high school, who, according to Ford, was at the party where the alleged assault took place (although not in the same room). Keyser initially stated through her attorney that while she did not recall the evening in question, she believed Ford, but in a later interview she stated that she no longer does. The interview revealed that Keyser, who is a Democrat, had felt pressured earlier to corroborate Ford's account.

Did Mitchell believe Kavanaugh would be prosecuted?

Following the hearing, Mitchell produced a report stating that she did not believe a reasonable prosecutor would bring a case against Kavanaugh based on the evidence presented to the Committee and adding that there were multiple inconsistencies in Ford's testimony. Mitchell asserted that Ford's case was "even weaker than" the standard "he said, she said" case, because other witnesses identified by Ford "either refuted her allegations, or failed to corroborate them".

Did Feinstein raise Kavanaugh's background check?

Feinstein said that owing to her confidentiality commitment to Ford, she did not raise the issue in the initial Kavanaugh confirmation proceedings. On September 12, The Intercept reported (without naming Ford) that Feinstein was withholding a Kavanaugh-related document from fellow Judiciary Committee Democrats. On September 13, Feinstein referred Ford's letter to the FBI, which redacted Ford's name and forwarded the letter to the White House as an update to Kavanaugh's background check. The White House in turn sent the letter to the full Senate Judiciary Committee.