Singing, Chanting and Rage on Capitol Hill as Kavanaugh Vote Nears

WASHINGTON — It started almost plaintively. “Why aren’t you brave enough to talk to us?” a protester demanded of Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, as he waited for an elevator in a Senate office building Thursday.

Hatch, shielded by aides, waggled his fingers dismissively at her.

“Don’t you wave your hand at me!” she responded. “I wave my hand at you!”

Hatch waved her off yet again, telling her and other protesters that he would talk to them “when you grow up.” They exploded in fury.

“How dare you talk to women that way!” the woman said, as Hatch retreated to the back of the elevator car, then, grinning from behind his aides, waved off the women a final time.

The group rushed the door. “How dare you?” they said again and again.

On a steamy day in the capital on Thursday, there was singing, chanting and rage as several thousand protesters, most of them female, made a late stand against the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

Chanting “Whose court? Our court!” and “We believe survivors,” they marched to the Supreme Court in a demonstration that began with emotional testimonials by sexual assault survivors on the steps of the court and culminated in a sit-down protest in a nearby Senate office building that generated scores of arrests.

The demonstration was part of a raucous, urgent effort to influence deliberations in the tightly patrolled Capitol two blocks away.

There, senators, flanked by reporters and photographers, traveled down a dim corridor, surrendered their phones and entered a secure room to view a 6-inch stack of paper, the FBI’s findings from its background investigation into accusations of sexual misconduct against Kavanaugh.

The scene was less dramatic than the fracas nearby. But the single copy of the FBI report, and how a small group of undecided senators respond to it, is likely to help decide whether Kavanaugh will be elevated to the court when the Senate votes on his nomination in coming days, with a critical procedural vote scheduled for Friday.

Outside, against the glare of the Supreme Court’s white-pillared facade, women and a man or two took the stage, telling stories of sexual assault and abuse, some for the first time publicly.

They saluted Christine Blasey Ford, who testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her some 36 years ago, when both were in high school.

Warning “November is coming,” a reference to the midterm elections on Nov. 6, they directed pleas, and warnings of political consequences, at three wavering Republicans: Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Jeff Flake of Arizona, at whose behest the FBI investigation was initiated last week.

Early Thursday the police closed off the hallway outside Collins’ office, preventing journalists from interviewing her, and protesters from buttonholing her. On the court steps, three women from Maine told their stories, imploring her to believe the survivors of sexual assault.

A group of more than 100 Alaskans planned to visit Murkowski’s office on Friday, some with their children in tow. Several Arizona residents were among those who spoke on the Supreme Court steps, seeking to keep the pressure on Flake.

In the Capitol, Democrats denounced the FBI interviews as incomplete and insufficient, while nearly all Republicans said they were thorough but unnecessary, given what they said was extensive vetting of Kavanaugh.

This chasm was reflected in street confrontations around the Capitol, as demonstrators faced off with supporters of President Donald Trump and his nominee, some of them men wearing bright pink polo shirts and “Make America Great Again” caps.

One man carried a homemade sign that read “#MeToo Fraud,” before a protester tore it in half. He called out “God bless Trump; God bless Kavanaugh,” as rape survivors told their stories and two women, Michela Vawter, of Burlington, Vermont, and Kiki Hackett, of Phoenix, quietly asked him to stop.

After the testimonials, protest leaders led the crowd, ranging from college students to octogenarians, to the Hart Senate Office Building, for a sit-down protest in the soaring atrium. Protesters filled three balconies overlooking the atrium, cheering, shooting cellphone video and raising their fists as police made arrests. Signs reading “Fighting for Our Lives,” water bottles and paper littered the marble floor alongside a towering Calder sculpture.

Members of Congress “are sending the message that they are not taking sexual assault seriously with this investigation, which has been extremely rushed,” said one protester, Sarah Burgess, who like Blasey graduated from Holton-Arms School in suburban Washington, and was an author of a letter of support signed by 1,200 alumnae.

“I’m here to continue to ask my senators to take sexual assault seriously,” she said.