Opinion | Michael D’Antonio
In Congress and in the Church, powerful men protect their own
AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley gavels the start of a committee meeting on Sept. 13, 2018.
As Christine Blasey Ford confronts the US Senate with her
charge of sexual assault against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh,
the elderly men in charge — all members of an entitled elite — are
following a familiar pattern. A man groomed to hold black-robe power
wants more of it from an institution that supposedly serves a greater
good. GOP senators are trying to give it to him while appearing to act
justly. The parallels to the sex abuse crisis in the Catholic Church,
including the arrival of a second accuser, abound.
From the moment that Ford’s allegations surfaced, the Republicans who run the Senate have feigned concern. Yes, she should speak, but no independent investigation would be conducted. No witnesses would be heard. She would stand alone before them against a former Supreme Court clerk and White House staffer who has spent more than a decade as a judge in the most important appeals court in the nation.
In the church, men whose positions gave them immense authority also served as both investigators and deciders in sex-abuse cases. A priest’s value would be weighed against the word of a person recalling an attack that occurred years in the past but left a permanent scar. Claimants had no access to witnesses, or documents that would reveal the truth. Many were accused themselves of faulty memory, misunderstanding, or fabrication. So it went, thousands of times, as powerful men protected their own.
When I researched my book about the Catholic crisis, “Mortal Sins,” it became evident that the church’s status as a private body granted great deference, denied victims due process, and gave it a powerful shield. When journalists of the Boston Globe and others forced the truth into view, this protection began to weaken. News reports about one victim led others to come forward. This has happened in the Kavanagh case, where Kavanaugh’s classmate at Yale, Deborah Ramirez, has alleged he exposed himself to her at a college party. If the pattern holds, more incidents will be reported.
From the moment that Ford’s allegations surfaced, the Republicans who run the Senate have feigned concern. Yes, she should speak, but no independent investigation would be conducted. No witnesses would be heard. She would stand alone before them against a former Supreme Court clerk and White House staffer who has spent more than a decade as a judge in the most important appeals court in the nation.
In the church, men whose positions gave them immense authority also served as both investigators and deciders in sex-abuse cases. A priest’s value would be weighed against the word of a person recalling an attack that occurred years in the past but left a permanent scar. Claimants had no access to witnesses, or documents that would reveal the truth. Many were accused themselves of faulty memory, misunderstanding, or fabrication. So it went, thousands of times, as powerful men protected their own.
When I researched my book about the Catholic crisis, “Mortal Sins,” it became evident that the church’s status as a private body granted great deference, denied victims due process, and gave it a powerful shield. When journalists of the Boston Globe and others forced the truth into view, this protection began to weaken. News reports about one victim led others to come forward. This has happened in the Kavanagh case, where Kavanaugh’s classmate at Yale, Deborah Ramirez, has alleged he exposed himself to her at a college party. If the pattern holds, more incidents will be reported.
Like the bishops who didn’t go to the police when crimes against children were claimed, Grassley has kept the process in-house. Meanwhile Mike Davis, the Grassley aide responsible for the nomination process, announced, “We will confirm Judge Kavanaugh.”
Davis revealed he was handling some of the dirty work in this case, just as lawyers did the dirty work of conducting sham reviews in so many church cases. The appalling breadth of this effort was demonstrated when GOP activist Ed Whelan declared that someone else — whom he named — was the likely perpetrator.
Whelan’s charge, soon retracted, was foreshadowed when Senator Orrin Hatch, another “bishop” on the committee, said, “I think she’s mistaking something, but I don’t know, I mean, I don’t know her.” Hatch does know Kavanaugh, and this permitted him to say he is a “good man.” Next, President Donald Trump, the pope in this context, offered sneering skepticism: “. . . if the attack on Dr. Ford was as bad as she says, charges would have been immediately filed with local Law Enforcement Authorities by either her or her loving parents. I ask that she bring those filings forward so that we can learn date, time, and place!”
Grassley’s immediate superior in the GOP hierarchy, Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell, said of the controversy, “Don’t get rattled by all this. We’re gonna plow right through it.” McConnell offered this promise at a gathering called the Values Voter Summit.
Only the callously partisan would ignore the truth about sexual assault and young people and treat this case as a contest to be won by whatever means necessary. Victims generally keep things to themselves. When they do speak up, it’s because they feel they have no other choice. And given the usual reaction — witness what’s happening to Ford — they face great peril when they do.
The example set by the Catholic Church, which so mishandled its crisis that it has continued for decades, suggests that the strategy chosen by Grassley, Hatch, Trump, and the rest may devastate the GOP, even if it saves Kavanaugh’s nomination. Just as many Catholics left the church because they were appalled by the power plays used by its leaders, voters who see how Republicans are responding to Ford will turn their backs on an institution that once enjoyed their loyalty.
Michael D’Antonio is author of a biography of Donald Trump and of “Mortal Sins, Sex Crimes and the Era of Catholic Scandal.”
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