President Donald Trump turned Friday that he had ordered the FBI to conduct a “supplemental investigation” into an declaration of sexual assault against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
Trump answered that the probe “must be limited in scope and completed in less than one week.”
Chalky House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tweeted out Trump’s account Friday afternoon.
Sanders tweet
Sanders’ tweet came upstanding hours after Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., called for a delay in Kavanaugh’s sure confirmation vote by up to a week to allow the FBI to investigate “credible” allegations of sex misconduct against the Supreme Court nominee.
The announcement is a dramatic concession from Trump, who had strongly ok Kavanaugh in the wake of the judge’s incendiary testimony before the Senate Judiciary Panel a day earlier.
Minutes before Sanders’ tweet, Kavanaugh released a allegation through White House deputy press secretary Raj Shah on Friday:
“All the way through this process, I’ve been interviewed by the FBI, I’ve done a number of “background” recruits directly with the Senate, and yesterday, I answered questions under warrant about every topic the Senators and their counsel asked me. I’ve done the entirety they have requested and will continue to cooperate.”
Testifying below oath before the committee on Thursday, a visibly furious and emotional Kavanaugh had withheld Christine Blasey Ford’s allegation that he sexually assaulted her in the antediluvian 1980s when they were teenagers.
Ford had offered her maiden publicly spoken words about the alleged assault in the Senate hark to before Kavanaugh. She said an intoxicated Kavanaugh, with participation from his classmate Dent Judge, had held her down on a bed, covered her mouth and tried to disrobe her.
Kavanaugh has often denied the allegation, and told the committee, “I’ve never sexually assaulted anyone.”
In a report following Trump’s decision, Ford’s lawyer Debra Katz explained that “a thorough FBI investigation is critical to developing all the relevant facts.”
Ford “salutations this step in the process, and appreciates the efforts of Senators Flake, Murkowski, Manchin and Collins — and all other senators who press supported an FBI investigation — to ensure it is completed before the Senate votes on Adjudge Kavanaugh’s nomination,” Katz said. “No artificial limits as to time or elbow-room should be imposed on this investigation.”
WATCH: Trump says Ford’s affidavit very compelling