During the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, Dr. Christine Blasey Ford indicated that she had not been made aware of multiple offers made by Chairman Chuck Grassley to send staff to California to interview her, a format that she said she would have preferred. Those offers were made in public statements and in statements directly to Dr. Ford’s attorneys in the days leading up to her public testimony. Here’s a summary of those offers:
On three occasions, Grassley and Judiciary Committee staff told Dr. Ford’s lawyers that committee investigators were willing to come to her.
In a September 21 tweet, Grassley invited Dr. Ford to share her story, saying, “[c]ome to us or we to [you].”
However, despite those offers, at the September 27 hearing, Dr. Ford told the committee that she was not aware of the committee’s willingness to meet her anywhere to take her testimony.
Clearly, Dr. Ford’s attorneys did not tell her that we could protect her privacy and speak to her in California. The ABA’s Model Rules of Professional Conduct require a lawyer to consult with his or her client about the means to be used to accomplish the client’s objectives—including informing the client of settlement offers. It is deeply unfortunate that Dr. Ford’s Democratic-activist lawyers appear to have used Dr. Ford in order to advance their own political agenda. A lot of pain and hardship could have been avoided had Dr. Ford’s attorneys informed her or the committee’s offer to meet her in California to receive her testimony.
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