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Anonymous letter accusing Brett Kavanaugh of assault sent to Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner

Posted at 9:04 PM, Sep 26, 2018
and last updated 2018-09-26 23:30:42-04
Brett Kavanaugh
Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.

WASHINGTON – An anonymous letter sent to Republican Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner claims  Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh assaulted a woman in the late 1990s, marking yet another accusation against Kavanaugh.

The letter, which contained a Denver zip code but no return address, was from someone who claimed Kavanaugh pushed a woman against a wall “very aggressively and sexually.”

The Senate Judiciary Committee brought up the allegation Tuesday in a call with Kavanaugh. The transcript of that call showed Kavanaugh denied the claim.

“No, and we’re dealing with an anonymous letter about an anonymous person and an anonymous friend. It’s ridiculous. Total twilight zone. And no, I’ve never done anything like that,” Kavanaugh said.

The letter said the author’s daughter knew Kavanaugh in 1998 and that the author’s daughter’s friend was dating him. The letter said Kavanaugh was inebriated when the incident happened.

The last portion of the letter reads:

“There were at least four witnesses including my daughter. Her friend (still traumatized) called my daughter yesterday (Sept. 21, 2018) wondering what to due (sic) about it. They decided to remain anonymous.”

Also discussed during the call was a fifth allegation reported to Democratic Rhode Island Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse made by a Rhode Island man. That man reported that Kavanaugh was involved in a sexual assault on a boat off the coast of Newport, Rhode Island in 1985.

The man called said a close acquaintance told him she was sexually assaulted on a boat by two inebriated men named Mark and Brett. The man said the woman told him they met at a local bar.

According to the caller, he heard about the assault at 5 a.m. the next morning. The man said he and another man went to the boat and left two men with significant injuries.

The man said when he saw Kavanaugh’s high school yearbook picture on television last weekend, he recognized him as one of the men on the boat.

Kavanaugh again denied this claim as well, saying “No. I was not in Newport, haven’t been on a boat in Newport. Not with Mark Judge on a boat, nor all those three things combined. This is just completely made up, or at least not me. I don’t know what they’re referring to.”

The Rhode Island man’s name was not released by the committee.

The newest allegations come as Kavanaugh is fending off a third accusation, from another woman who did not choose to remain anonymous.

Julie Swetnick says in a sworn statement that she witnessed Kavanaugh “consistently engage in excessive drinking and inappropriate contact of a sexual nature with women in the early 1980s.”

Swetnick’s lawyer, Michael Avenatti, tells The Associated Press that his client won’t consider the committee’s request until it agrees to his demand for an FBI investigation of the accusation. He says doing the interview today would be “ridiculous.”

Avenatti represents Julie Swetnick. She’s accusing the Supreme Court nominee of sexual misconduct in the early 1980s.

Meanwhile, the lawyer for Deborah Ramirez, who says Kavanaugh exposed himself to her at a party when they attended Yale University, raised her profile in a round of television interviews.

The Senate Judiciary Committee will hear from just two witnesses Thursday: Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford, a California psychology professor who accuses him of attempting to rape her when they were teens.

The lawyer for a third woman accusing Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct says he won’t agree to a Senate Judiciary Committee request to interview her immediately.

(The Associated Press contributed to this story)