This is a developing story, and I want to get it up quickly. So this won’t be a comprehensive survey. (Note: the headline initially indicated an 11-8 vote, which is what I heard Grassley conclude on the TV. However, Fox’s story on this says “11-10,” so we’ll go with that.)
Just before the vote, Jeff Flake said for the record in committee that he would vote to advance Kavanaugh, but his condition was that the full Senate vote be delayed for up to a week, to allow the FBI to wave its mythical Magical FBI Wand over the allegations about Kavanaugh.
Reportedly, the Democrats had cornered Flake after the recess from the morning’s bloviation session and harangued him for quite a while. (There were even reports of Senator Coons, a good friend of Flake, leaving the chamber near tears after Flake announced earlier that he would be a “yes” vote on the nomination.)
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Flake’s condition, stated to the committee, produced an uproar of annoyance on Twitter.
However, Senator Grassley then immediately called the committee vote (as noted earlier, scheduled for half an hour ago), without committing to Flake’s condition.
So we don’t know if Grassley or McConnell will take the Flake stipulation for action.
More as it becomes available.
