WHEELING, W.Va.—As the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh headed into overtime, Trump supporters at a recent West Virginia rally shared their opinion on the process.
Denise K., who declined to give her surname because of her liberal workplace, called the whole Kavanaugh process a “Salem witch trial.”
“For the instance that it’s very vague, it can’t be proven—you can’t prove a negative. You can’t prove that you didn’t do something, unequivocally,” she said on Sept. 29. “It’s Democrat smear tactics. They’ve had that information since July.”
Denise said she’s been assaulted several times and is angry at the way Kavanaugh’s accusers have acted.
“This is just a circus. Things like this make it so much harder for victims to be believed. I think it’s horrible,” she said.
“For my instances [of sexual assault], I know exactly where I was. I know the date it was. I know where I was.”
Denise said she has warned her two teenage sons.
Innocent Until Proven Guilty
Desert Storm veteran Floyd Conaway, 54, said he disagrees with the one-week delay on Kavanaugh’s nomination vote to allow the FBI to conduct an investigation into the accusations leveled by Christine Blasey Ford.“Honestly, I think they’ve had the opportunity to ask him every question that the FBI’s going to ask him,” he said.
“I think they should have had the vote, and however it fell, it fell,” he said. “[Ford] was given the opportunity to present her case, and they were able to question her. They also were able to talk to the witnesses that she gave them, and none of them could corroborate her story. So to me, that’s a lot of red flags there, and he had no red flags.”
Conaway said he believes Ford may have been assaulted by someone in the past, “but I think she’s being used as a pawn by the Democrat Party as leverage to try to stop the process until the election.”
“I don’t want to see any woman get abused, and if something did happen to her, then I'd like to see justice for her,” he said.
‘A Terrible Travesty’
Jo Ann Gould said she cried when she watched the Senate confirmation hearings.“I felt so bad for him and his family. This was a terrible travesty. This was a good man that dedicated his life to service, and I think he’s done an excellent job,” she said. “And I don’t disbelieve her. I do believe something happened to her, but I don’t think it was him.”
Gould said, as women, “things happen to all of us,” but believes Ford was manipulated.
“I think that it was very unfortunate, and I think that people are taking advantage of her. My heart goes out to her, actually,” she said.
Gould said if Kavanaugh is not confirmed, but also not found guilty of a crime, it sets a terrible precedent for men.
‘Politics Is Ugly’
Michael Marsh, a farmer and a military veteran, said he thinks Kavanaugh was railroaded.“That being said, I think the attack on him has been completely fabricated, so I’m not worried about the whole FBI investigation or anything,” he said, adding that the same thing happened to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas in 1991 during his confirmation process.
“Politics is ugly, it’s always been ugly, and it’s just getting uglier and uglier,” Marsh said. “People have just got to chill and ... just give people a chance.”
He said he thinks Kavanaugh will end up being confirmed, but if not, someone else will. “[Trump’s] got a big list, so I’m not too worried about it.”
Patriotism
Don Hindman and Mary Konieccny were part of a Bikers for Trump group from Pittsburgh that attended the rally. Hindman explained the connection between Bikers for Trump and the president: “We’re Americans and we’re patriots.”Hindman, 54, a building inspector, said Kavanaugh will be confirmed, and meanwhile, “Democrats are making fools of themselves.”
“We’ve got to get rid of these career politicians. Everybody’s tired of it. They’ve gone away from ‘we the people’ to ‘we the party,’” Hindman said.
He said he is sure Republicans will win big in the midterm elections on Nov. 6.
“Number one, the media is a bunch of lying fools,” he said of the polling estimates. “And number two, I can’t believe there are that many stupid people in this country who would vote for those idiots [Democrats]—that’s as clean as I can keep it. I mean the country’s going fantastic, and they want to stop it.”
Konieccny, a nurse, said that under Trump, the level of patriotism in America has indeed increased.
“And that doesn’t mean racism, nationalism; it doesn’t mean whatever these words the Democrats [use], who’ve swirled the meaning,” she said. “Patriotism means God, country, family, all that good stuff—and that’s what Trump represents.”
Konieccny said she believes something happened to Ford, but she believes Kavanaugh “without a doubt.”
Lack of Evidence
Barber John Mariner, 28, said he believes Kavanaugh will be confirmed.“There’s a huge lack of evidence, and there should be no speculation before all evidence is in and no one should ever be treated as guilty before being proven guilty—in any scenario,” he said.
“I think the people who already weren’t for Kavanaugh still aren’t, and I think it was a waste of time for them.”
Mariner said he has followed the nomination process.
“I listened to him talk, and if the way he spoke about his daughters and his Christian values ... is anything like him, I would support him more than what I would have before,” he said. “He seems like a decent person in a bad spot.”
