Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY — Sen. Orrin Hatch lit into Democrats again Thursday with some colorful language to describe their efforts to stop Brett Kavanaugh from being confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court.
"It’s just amazing to me that they make such a farce out of this," Hatch, R-Utah, said at news conference with members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, including Sen. Mike Lee, R-Utah.
Republicans say Democrats are seeking to review what could be as many as 900,000 pages on Kavanaugh from his tenure in the George W. Bush administration as an associate White House counsel as a stall tactic. The files don't include his 300 published opinions as a federal appellate court judge the past 12 years.
Hatch said he's "sick and tired" of the partisanship and that Kavanaugh would ultimately be confirmed.
"I want to really compliment the Democrats who have stood up and are willing to stand up for Judge Kavanaugh because they realize we can’t keep going down this partisan, picky, stupid, dumbass road that has happened around here for so long," he said.
Lee said the papers would be taller than London's Big Ben — 315 feet high — if stacked and would stretch 11.0 "Kavanaugh-tical" miles if laid end to end. Having to examine that many documents would only delay the process at the request of a lot of senators who aren't voting for Kavanaugh anyway, he said.
In a USA Today op-ed Thursday, Hatch wrote that Democrats are trying to "Bork" Kavanaugh.
"In their zeal to portray Judge Kavanaugh as the embodiment of our greatest fears, Democrats have gone Borking mad," he said.
Related story:
Hatch vows to do all in his power to confirm Kavanaugh to Supreme Court
Sen. Orrin Hatch vowed Tuesday to do everything in his power to see that Judge Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court.The term Bork — recognized in the Oxford American Dictionary since 2002 — refers to what Hatch called the "unprecedented campaign of character assassination" waged against Judge Robert Bork during his 1987 Supreme Court confirmation hearing.
"Mother Teresa could be our nominee, and the left would still find something to complain about," Hatch said.
