Grassley wrote on Twitter that he agreed to grant another delay for Ford to decide if and how she will testify, not mentioning any specific dates. Grassley added that with all the extensions he had already given he feels like “playing 2nd trombone in the judiciary orchestra”. He also noted that this is the sixth delay he gives to Ford, saying that he wants to hear her testimony.
The previous deadline was set on Friday 10 pm for Ford to submit her written testimony if she is to present on Monday hearings, however, lawyers for a 51-year-old professor from California sent an email to Judiciary Committee asking for an extra day for her to consider testifying. Ford’s lawyer Debra Katz earlier called the 10 pm deadline “arbitrary” and “aggressive and artificial.”
“The imposition of aggressive and artificial deadlines regarding the date and conditions of any hearing has created tremendous and unwarranted anxiety and stress on Dr. Ford,” Katz wrote.
She and other Ford’s lawyers asked for the hearings to be moved on Thursday, asked for the additional witness and for Kavanaugh to testify first. Committee rejected the request for another witness and said that Kavanaugh will testify second, yet offered Ford a Wednesday hearing. They had also agreed to limit the number of cameras and to keep Kavanaugh and Ford out of the same room. Previous request from Ford’s lawyers were to delay the hearings until the FBI holds an investigations on sexual assault allegations, yet these requests were denied both by the Judiciary Committee and the Department of Justice.
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Ford accused Trump’s Supreme Court nominee Kavanaugh of nailing her down, groping and trying to remove her clothes at a high school party in the 1980s. Kavanaugh denied all allegations, saying he is ready to testify next week.