When the father of a school shooting victim held out his hand to Donald Trump’s nominee for the supreme court on Tuesday, Judge Brett Kavanaugh looked at him, then turned without saying a word and walked out. 
 
 “I put out my hand and I said: ‘My name is Fred Guttenberg, father of Jaime Guttenberg, who was murdered in Parkland,’ and he walked away,” Guttenberg said in an interview with the Guardian. 
 
 The moment was captured in dramatic photographs, as well as on video from several different angles. In a statement after the incident, a White House spokesman said that “an unidentified individual” had approached Kavanaugh as he was preparing to leave for the confirmation hearing’s lunch break and that “before the Judge was able to shake his hand, security had intervened”. 
 
 Brett Kavanaugh fails to shake hands with Parkland victim's father – as it happened Read more 
 
 “If you watch the video, you see that’s not the case, ” Guttenberg said. “What the White House said was not true.” 
 
 Kavanaugh made eye contact with him “long enough for me to say who I was”, Guttenberg said. “He could have absolutely shook my hand and said: ‘I’m sorry for your loss.’ I mean – if nothing else.” 
 
 In an email, the White House spokesman, Raj Shah, wrote: “I stand by my tweet/email on this topic,” when asked about video of the interaction that appears to contradict the White House’s claim that security had intervened “before the Judge was able to shake [Guttenberg’s] hand”. 
 
 Kavanaugh, a champion of gun rights, has been backed by the National Rifle Association, which announced in August that it was spending at least $1m on a national advertising campaign to support the judge’s confirmation to the supreme court. 
 
 In the video advertisement released by the NRA, an announcer warns, “Four liberal justices oppose your right to self-defense. Four justices support your right to self-defense. President Trump chose Brett Kavanaugh to break the tie. Your right to self-defense depends on this vote.” 
 
 An NRA spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on the interaction between Kavanaugh and the father of a school shooting victim. 
 
 Guttenberg has become a prominent advocate for gun control, including stricter regulation on military-style “assault weapons”, after his 14-year-old daughter, Jaime, was shot to death in her school hallway this February with a legally purchased AR-15-style rifle. He said he had attended the hearing in hopes of making Kavanaugh consider the consequences of his position on the second amendment. 
 
 Parkland students: our manifesto to change America's gun laws | Editorial staff of the Eagle Eye Read more 
 
 “I wanted to be there to make sure he understands what he’s being asked to do has real-world consequences,” Guttenberg said. “As he sat there thinking about his beautiful family, I wanted him to know that my family was torn apart by gun violence, preventable gun violence, the kind of gun violence that people can do something about, and he doesn’t believe that.” 
 
 Kavanaugh wrote in a 2011 dissent that the District of Columbia’s assault weapon ban was unconstitutional, because the weapons were already “in common use”. He argued that there was no “meaningful or persuasive” distinction between semi-automatic handguns and rifles, and noted, correctly, that handguns were more frequently used in crime than rifles are. 
 
 Gun control advocates say that if Kavanaugh is confirmed to the supreme court, which is currently divided between justices who support gun rights and gun control, he may serve as the swing vote to make state and federal assault weapon bans unconstitutional, as well as to tear down local restrictions on carrying guns in public. 
 
 Earlier in the day, Guttenberg said, he had been publicly introduced during the hearing by Senator Dianne Feinstein, who had invited him as her guest. He said he thought Kavanaugh would probably have been able to recognize who he was from that introduction, even before he introduced himself again. 
 
 Asked if he thought the NRA’s backing of his confirmation might have played any role in Kavanaugh’s choice not to speak to him or shake his hand, Guttenberg said: “You know what? I don’t know. I don’t put myself in other people’s heads.” 
 
 After lunch, when the hearing resumed, “security came and took me out of the room and they kept me out for 15 minutes, questioning me”, Guttenberg said. “They took my license and wanted to know why I was there.” 
 
 Afterwards, he said, he was allowed to return as the hearing continued. 
 
 Guttenberg added in an interview with CNN on Tuesday evening that he thought security took him out of the room after the break because Kavanaugh pointed him out to them and asked them to. 
 
 Gun control advocates, including some student survivors of the Parkland shooting, argued on Tuesday that Kavanaugh’s refusal to greet the father of a gun murder victim showed a lack of character, as well as reflecting his strongly pro-gun legal views. 
 
 Andrew Pollack, another, more conservative father of a Parkland gun violence victim, publicly defended the judge on Tuesday. “Judge Kavanaugh was not responsible for the Parkland school shooting that killed my daughter,” he said, placing blame instead on local law enforcement and school officials. “Judge Kavanaugh is a decent man and should be confirmed. Stop weaponizing Parkland to advance a dangerous political agenda!” ||||| Fred Guttenberg, father of Parkland victim, Jaime, tries to shakes hands with Brett Kavanaugh: "My daughter was murdered at Parkland." White House says an "unidentified individual approached" Kavanaugh, but "before the judge was able to shake his hand, security had intervened."pic.twitter.com/IerpDMOW0h ||||| An attorney for Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who has accused Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her when they were teenagers, said Thursday that her appearing at a hearing on Monday to detail her claims is “not possible” but that she could testify later in the week. 
 
 Debra Katz, Ford’s lawyer, relayed the response to top staffers on the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, requesting to set up a call with them to “discuss the conditions under which [Ford] would be prepared to testify next week.” 
 
 “As you are aware, she’s been receiving death threats which have been reported to the FBI and she and her family have been forced out of their home,” Katz wrote to the committee. “She wishes to testify, provided that we can agree on terms that are fair and which ensure her safety. A hearing on Monday is not possible and the committee’s insistence that it occur then is arbitrary in any event.” 
 
 The chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), said through a spokesman late Thursday that he would be consulting with colleagues on how to proceed. Kavanaugh wrote to Grassley in a letter released by the White House that he looks forward to testifying. 
 
 “I continue to want a hearing as soon as possible, so that I can clear my name,” Kavanaugh said in the letter. “Since the moment I first heard this allegation, I have categorically and unequivocally denied it. I remain committed to defending my integrity.” 
 
 Amid the maneuvering, the nomination was roiled further late Thursday by incendiary tweets from a prominent Kavanaugh friend and supporter who publicly identified another high school classmate of Kavanaugh’s as Ford’s possible attacker. 
 
 Ed Whelan, a former clerk to the late justice Antonin Scalia and president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, pointed to floor plans, online photographs and other information to suggest a location for the house party in suburban Maryland that Ford described. He also named and posted photographs of the classmate he suggested could be responsible. 
 
 Ford dismissed Whelan’s theory in a statement late Thursday: “I knew them both, and socialized with” the other classmate, Ford said, adding that she had once visited him in the hospital. “There is zero chance that I would confuse them.” 
 
 Republicans on Capitol Hill and White House officials immediately sought to distance themselves from Whelan’s claims and said they were not aware of his plans to identify the former classmate, now a middle school teacher, who could not be reached for comment and did not answer the door at his house Thursday night. 
 
 Whelan did not respond to requests for comment. He had told people around him that he had spent several days putting together the theory and thought it was more convincing than her story, according to two friends who had talked to him. 
 
 On Friday morning, Whelan said he had made an “inexcusable mistake” by identifying Kavanaugh’s classmate. 
 
 “I made an appalling and inexcusable mistake of judgment in posting the tweet thread in a way that identified Kavanaugh’s Georgetown Prep classmate,” he said on Twitter. “I take full responsibility for that mistake, and I deeply apologize for it. I realize that does not undo the mistake.” 
 
 Whelan has been involved in helping to advise Kavanaugh’s confirmation effort and is close friends with both Kavanaugh and Leonard Leo, the head of the Federalist Society who has been helping to spearhead the nomination. Kavanaugh and Whelan also worked together in the Bush administration. 
 
 Kavanaugh and his allies have been privately discussing a defense that would not question whether an incident involving Ford happened, but instead would raise doubts that the attacker was Kavanaugh, according to a person familiar with the discussions. 
 
 Democratic senators, pointing to the highly charged Anita Hill hearings in October 1991, have defended Ford’s request to have the FBI do its own probe before she testifies. Back then, the FBI report into Hill’s allegations of sexual harassment against now-Justice Clarence Thomas was finished on Sept. 26, 1991 — three days after its inquiry began, according to a Washington Post report at the time. 
 
 “Someone who is lying does not ask the FBI to investigate their claims,” Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) said Thursday at an event on Capitol Hill. “Who is not asking the FBI to investigate these claims? The White House. Judge Kavanaugh has not asked to have the FBI investigate these claims. Is that the reaction of an innocent person? It is not.” 
 
 Gillibrand said Senate Republicans’ ultimatum of a Monday hearing was “bullying.” 
 
 Republicans have rejected the comparisons to the Hill proceedings. Grassley wrote in a Wednesday letter to Democrats on the Judiciary Committee that the FBI investigated Hill’s accusations against Thomas when they were still not public. Because Ford’s accusation is already public, Grassley argued that it was appropriate for the Senate to step in with its own investigation as lawmakers did when the Hill allegation first became public. 
 
 A senior Senate Democratic aide noted that reopening FBI background checks was fairly routine; 10 such probes into judicial nominees had been reopened in the past three months alone, the aide said. A Republican aide didn’t dispute the figure but said those updates can be relatively minor, such as adding a nominee’s tax records or educational information that had been inadvertently excluded. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Judiciary Committee has interviewed lawyers to be potential outside counsel who would lead the questioning in the highly charged hearing, according to two people familiar with the process. If the outside counsel was a woman, it could help with an optics issue facing the 11 Republican senators on the committee, all of whom are men. 
 
 The objective of bringing in an outside lawyer, one Senate GOP official said, would be having an “experienced attorney who hasn’t been so deeply involved in the nomination and could bring some fresh eyes to evaluate everything fairly and firmly.” 
 
 A variation of this plan had been discussed since at least Tuesday, when Republicans had discussed a proposal to hire a female attorney and have her do all the questioning, while the GOP senators on the committee would ask no questions, according to another Senate GOP official. 
 
 “There is a deliberate and conscious effort to not seem like we are attacking the woman in any way,” this person said. 
 
 Earlier this week, Kavanaugh told Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah), one of his most fervent supporters, that Ford has the wrong perpetrator in mind and that he has not attended a party like the one Ford described in an account she gave The Post this week of the alleged assault. 
 
 A handful of pivotal senators have yet to disclose how they will ultimately vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation, including Republican Sens. Susan Collins (Maine) and Lisa Murkowski (Alaska). On Thursday, Alaska Gov. Bill Walker and Lt. Gov. Byron Mallott — who are both running as independents — issued a statement opposing Kavanaugh’s nomination. 
 
 “Mr. Kavanaugh’s record does not demonstrate a commitment to legal precedent that protects working families,” Walker and Mallott said in the joint statement, remarks that could put political pressure on Murkowski. “Key aspects of our nation’s health-care and labor laws may be at risk if Mr. Kavanaugh receives a lifetime appointment.” 
 
 Earlier Thursday, Senate Republicans had reiterated their resolve to press forward with a vote on Kavanaugh in the coming days if Ford chose not to testify before the 21-member Judiciary Committee. 
 
 “If she doesn’t want to participate and tell her story, there’s no reason for us to delay,” Sen. John Cornyn (Tex.), the No. 2 Republican in the chamber, told CNN. “I think it all depends on what she decides to do. We’ve all made clear this is her chance.” 
 
 [Republicans push to confirm Kavanaugh amid fears it will come at a political cost] 
 
 Ford has alleged that while she and Kavanaugh were at a house party in the early 1980s, when the two were in high school, Kavanaugh drunkenly pinned her to a bed, groped her and put his hand over her mouth to stifle her screams as he tried to take off her clothes. Kavanaugh has repeatedly denied the allegations. 
 
 Late Thursday afternoon, Republican and Democratic staffers on the Judiciary Committee spoke on the phone with Katz to begin negotiations for a potential hearing next week. The first concern Katz raised on the call, according to a senior Senate aide directly familiar with the conversation, was the issue of Ford’s security — asking the staffers what the protocol is for ensuring that she is safe and whether reporters could be kept at a distance from her, as was done for Kavanaugh during his confirmation hearings. 
 
 The roughly 30-minute conversation also touched on the scope of the questions, and Katz raised concerns about the potential of an outside counsel coming in to question Ford, arguing that the scenario would be too much like a trial, according to the aide. Ford also does not want Kavanaugh in the hearing room when she testifies, Katz told the staffers, and requested that the nominee speak first. 
 
 Katz also raised the possibility of a subpoena for Mark Judge, the person who is alleged to have been in the room at the party, and other potential witnesses, and suggested that Thursday would be a good hearing date. 
 
 Republicans are sure to push back on Katz’s requests. One Senate GOP official familiar with the call said Ford’s request to have Kavanaugh testify first is a “non-starter,” adding that “it only makes sense for the accused to respond to the charge.” 
 
 The committee also does not plan to issue subpoenas, the GOP official said, who added that other potential witnesses have already made it clear they have no intention of testifying on this matter. 
 
 Republicans have so far stuck to the Monday timeline, as well as Grassley’s decision to limit the hearing to two witnesses: Kavanaugh and Ford. 
 
 “What is happening with the Judiciary Committee, really, I would call it a railroad job,” Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii) said alongside Gillibrand on Thursday. “They are totally intent on getting Judge Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court come hell or high water. . . . You have to ask yourself why.” 
 
 Hirono spoke at an event on Capitol Hill to highlight a letter of support that was said to have been signed by more than 1,000 alumni of Ford’s high school in Maryland. A flood of anti- 
 
 Kavanaugh protesters also descended on Capitol Hill Thursday while more Senate offices reported receiving threats related to the nomination. 
 
 “We’re getting a lot of calls, many of which are angry and some of which are threatening,” said Tom Mentzer, a spokesman for Sen. Dianne Feinstein ­(Calif.), the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee who has played a central role in the Ford developments. 
 
 Cornyn said Thursday that he sees no reason to call additional witnesses since the committee had already held a full hearing on Trump’s nominee. 
 
 “We already had a hearing,” Cornyn said. “That’s what I call hijacking the regular committee process to accommodate political interests.” 
 
 On Thursday, a group of eight Democrats wrote to President Trump, asking him to direct the FBI to reopen its background check on Kavanaugh, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. 
 
 The Democrats, all of whom served as prosecutors or state attorneys general, noted that President George H.W. Bush asked the FBI to investigate after Hill raised allegations against Thomas. 
 
 “Senate Republicans are attempting to make Dr. Blasey Ford testify on just a few days’ notice — without having the FBI follow up on her allegations and provide a report first,” said the letter, which was spearheaded by Sens. Kamala D. Harris (Calif.) and Amy Klobuchar (Minn.). “This strikes us as simply a check-the-box exercise in a rush to confirm Judge Kavanaugh.” 
 
 Alice Crites, Gabriel Pogrund, Beth Reinhard, John Wagner and Sharon Dunten contributed to this report. ||||| WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate Judiciary Committee has scheduled a hearing Thursday for Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh and Christine Blasey Ford, a woman who says he sexually assaulted her as a teenager, as a claim of sexual misconduct emerged from another woman. 
 
 The New Yorker magazine reported Sunday night that Senate Democrats were investigating a second woman's accusation of sexual misconduct by Kavanaugh dating to the 1983-84 academic year, Kavanaugh's first at Yale University. 
 
 The New Yorker said 53-year-old Deborah Ramirez described the incident in an interview after being contacted by the magazine. Ramirez recalled that Kavanaugh exposed himself at a drunken dormitory party, thrust his penis in her face, and caused her to touch it without her consent as she pushed him away, the magazine reported. 
 
 In a statement provided by the White House, Kavanaugh said the event "did not happen" and that the allegation was "a smear, plain and simple." A White House spokeswoman added in a second statement that the allegation was "designed to tear down a good man." 
 
 The new information came hours after the Senate committee agreed to a date and time for a hearing after nearly a week of uncertainty over whether Ford would appear to tell her story. 
 
 The agreement and the latest accusation set the stage for a dramatic showdown as Kavanaugh and Ford each tell their side of the story. The developments could also determine the fate of Kavanaugh's confirmation, which hangs on the votes of a handful of senators. 
 
 It had seemed assured before Ford, a 51-year-old California college professor, went public a week ago with her allegation that Kavanaugh assaulted her at a party when they were in high school. 
 
 Kavanaugh, 53, an appellate court judge, has denied Ford's allegation and said he wanted to testify as soon as possible to clear his name. 
 
 Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, wrangled with Ford's lawyers for the last week over the exact terms of her appearance. She made several requests, some of which were accommodated — a Thursday hearing, three days later than originally scheduled, and a smaller hearing room with less press access to avoid a media circus, for example. Grassley's staff also agreed to let Ford testify without Kavanaugh in the room, for there to be only one camera in the room, "adequate" breaks and a high security presence. 
 
 The committee said it would not negotiate on other points, though, including Ford's desire for additional witnesses and a request to testify after, not before, Kavanaugh. 
 
 "As with any witness who comes before the Senate, the Senate Judiciary Committee cannot hand over its constitutional duties to attorneys for outside witnesses," Mike Davis, Grassley's top nominations counsel, wrote in an email exchange with Ford's lawyers obtained by The Associated Press. "The committee determines which witnesses to call, how many witnesses to call, in what order to call them, and who will question them. These are non-negotiable." 
 
 Ford's lawyers said it was still unclear who will ask questions, as Republicans were trying to hire an outside female counsel who could take over the questioning. The 11 senators on the GOP side of the dais are all men, which could send an unwanted message on live television against the backdrop of the #MeToo era. They could also use Republican staff attorneys on the committee. 
 
 Democratic senators were expected to ask their own questions. 
 
 "We were told no decision has been made on this important issue, even though various senators have been dismissive of her account and should have to shoulder their responsibility to ask her questions," the attorneys for Ford said in a statement. 
 
 As he builds a case for his innocence, Kavanaugh plans to turn over to the committee calendars from the summer of 1982 that don't show a party consistent with Ford's description of the gathering in which she says he attacked her, The New York Times reported Sunday. The newspaper reported that it had examined the calendars and noted they list basketball games, movie outings, football workouts, college interviews, and a few parties with names of friends other than those identified by Ford. 
 
 A person working on Kavanaugh's confirmation confirmed the Times account to The Associated Press. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the matter. 
 
 Earlier Sunday, Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said lawyers for Ford were contesting two GOP conditions — that Ford and Kavanaugh would be the only witnesses and that an independent counsel would ask the questions. 
 
 "If they continue to contest those two things, there won't be a hearing," Graham said. "We're not going to let her determine how many people we call" and on outside counsel. "I hope she comes." 
 
 Graham, speaking on "Fox News Sunday," promised a fair hearing in which both Ford and Kavanaugh "will be challenged" but said "unless there's something more" to back up her accusation, he indicated he will vote to confirm Kavanaugh. Graham said he's "not going to ruin Judge Kavanaugh's life over this." 
 
 One issue that appeared to have been resolved in Sunday's hourlong phone call between Judiciary staff and Ford's lawyers was the committee's refusal to subpoena Mark Judge, the other person Ford alleges was in the room when the assault occurred. Judge has told the committee he does not recall the incident. 
 
 The lawyers for Ford want the committee to hear from other witnesses, including a person who conducted a polygraph of Ford earlier this year, the person familiar with the talks said. Ford's lawyers also want to call on two trauma experts, the person said. 
 
 Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat on the committee, said Sunday he believed Ford's requests have been reasonable and that she deserves a fair hearing to determine whether her allegations are serious enough to vote down Kavanaugh's nomination. 
 
 Durbin acknowledged that lawmakers will "probably not" be able to know the truth of Ford's decades-old accusation. But Durbin left little doubt that that Democrats will go after Kavanaugh's drinking history to help shed light on the matter. Ford has alleged Kavanaugh was "stumbling drunk" when it happened. 
 
 Durbin told ABC's "This Week" that some Republicans "reached out to Democratic senators and assured them that they are looking to this as kind of a determination as to how their final vote" on Kavanaugh is cast. 
 
 Democrats again called for the FBI to investigate Ford's claims, a request that was unlikely to be met as President Donald Trump and Senate Republicans have said it's unnecessary. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York and the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, sent a letter to Trump on Sunday saying the FBI has more than enough time to investigate before Ford and Kavanaugh testify on Thursday. 
 
 Republicans viewed the demands for an investigation, and Ford's various requests, as a way to delay voting on Trump's nominee. They have also cast some doubt on Ford's allegations, with the Judiciary panel announcing that it had investigated the incident and talked to three other people who Ford has told The Washington Post were at the party — Judge, Patrick J. Smyth and Leland Ingham Keyser. The committee said all three told investigators that they had no recollection of the evening in question. 
 
 The Post reported Sunday that Keyser said in a brief interview at her home that she still believes Ford, even if she doesn't remember the party. 
 
 The White House is approaching Ford's potential testimony with trepidation, nervous that an emotional performance might not just damage Kavanaugh's chances but could further energize female voters to turn out against Republicans in November. 
 
 Moreover, the West Wing aides who had urged Trump to remain muted in his response to the accusations worried about how the president might react to an hourslong, televised hearing. Trump broke his silence to cast doubt on Ford's story Friday in ways Republicans had been carefully trying to avoid. He said Kavanaugh was "under assault by radical left wing politicians" and suggested Ford should have filed charges as a 15-year-old when she was attacked. 
 
 Trump mused to confidants that the "fake" attacks against his nominee were meant to undermine his presidency, according to a White House official and a Republican close to the White House. Both spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss private conversations. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Associated Press writers Eric Tucker and Hope Yen in Washington and Jonathan Lemire in Bridgewater, New Jersey, contributed to this report.
– "Chaos" is the word being used to describe the first day of Brett Kavanaugh's Supreme Court confirmation hearing, and now new labels are being applied to Kavanaugh himself, including ill-mannered and "coward." Fred Guttenberg, whose 14-year-old daughter, Jaime, was killed in the Parkland shooting, said he approached Kavanaugh during a break in Tuesday's hearing to introduce himself. "I put out my hand and I said: 'My name is Fred Guttenberg, father of Jaime Guttenberg, who was murdered in Parkland,' and he walked away,'" Guttenberg tells the Guardian, adding on Twitter: "I guess he did not want to deal with the reality of gun violence." Videos from various angles are circulating, showing Kavanaugh stare at Guttenberg, with his extended hand, for two seconds before walking away. It's not clear if Kavanaugh heard Guttenberg's introduction. White House spokesman Raj Shah says "security … intervened" when an "unidentified individual" approached Kavanaugh, an explainer Guttenberg is refuting. "Incorrect. I was here all day and introduced by Senator [Dianne] Feinstein," who invited Guttenberg to the hearing, Guttenberg tweeted. The Parkland father said he'd simply wanted to speak to Kavanaugh, father to father, to let him "know that my family was torn apart by gun violence," and he dismissed theories that, although he doesn't support Kavanaugh's nomination, this was intended to make Kavanaugh look bad. Per the Hill and the Washington Post, Guttenberg says he was questioned by Capitol Police for about 15 minutes, then allowed to return to the hearing—and he thinks Kavanaugh is the one who pinpointed him to security. "He could have absolutely shook my hand and said: 'I'm sorry for your loss.' I mean—if nothing else," he tells the Guardian.