Republican leaders are putting a priority on confirming Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court because he may be the one to determine if President Donald Trump has to comply with a subpoena, and that is the most "craven and brazen kind of politics," Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., said Thursday.
His comments to MSNBC's "Morning Joe" came after hearing a recording of Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., speaking at a fundraiser. In the recording, which aired on MSNBC's Rachel Maddow's program Wednesday, Nunes said assistant U.S. Attorney Rod Rosenstein can't be impeached because that would imperil Kavanaugh's nomination.
Nunes further said Republicans have to keep their majority in Congress, because "if we do not, all this goes away."
Blumenthal said the second point about Nunes' words is they show that the "reason for retaining a Republican majority is simply to protect the president against potential consequence."
Rosenstein is ultimately the person who would approve an indictment against the budget and is responsible for the budget and personnel for Special Counsel Robert Mueller, Blumenthal continued, and he believes that firing or impeaching him is a core part of Republicans' strategy.
"In my view the Republican leadership is ambivalent," he said. "It knows what the right thing to do here is. It needs the grit and back bone to stand up and really uphold the rule of law."
That also applies to Kavanaugh, he said, because Republicans want to hide documents necessary to evaluate Kavanaugh's nomination, particularly documents related to his service in President George W. Bush's White House.
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