Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) told The Atlantic in an interview Friday night that he’d asked for a one-week pause in Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation process — so that the FBI can look into sexual assault allegations against Kavanaugh — in an attempt to preserve the credibility of “two institutions”: the Senate and the Supreme Court.
“The Supreme Court is the lone institution where most Americans still have some faith,” Flake said. “And then the U.S. Senate as an institution—we’re coming apart at the seams. There’s no currency, no market for reaching across the aisle. It just makes it so difficult.”
The magazine’s McKay Coppins asked Flake if he planned to continue supporting Kavanaugh’s confirmation “unless the FBI finds something in the next week that changes your mind?”
“Yes,” the senator, who’s retiring at the end of this term, replied. “I’m a conservative. He’s a conservative.”
“I plan to support him unless they turn up something—and they might,” Flake added.
