text: (CNN) The Senate Judiciary Committee will vote on whether to favorably recommend Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court as previously scheduled Friday morning, though top GOP senators did not know as of Thursday night whether enough key Republican votes had been convinced to confirm President Donald Trump's nominee. 
   
   Kavanaugh's supporters and critics are now closely watching a handful of key Republican senators as they decide whether to support the nominee, following a day-long, blockbuster hearing that featured both Kavanaugh and the woman who accused him of sexual assault. 
   
   The vote scheduled for Friday morning means undecided GOP members of the committee -- including Arizona Republican Sen. Jeff Flake -- have just hours to publicly choose a side in a deeply polarizing political fight. 
   
   As of Thursday night, Flake -- who also met earlier with fellow key votes Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin -- told reporters, "There's more doubt than certainty moving ahead." 
   
   "This isn't easy for anybody," Flake told reporters. "Some of us have been talking for a while -- similar questions I guess." 
   
   When asked if he thought more time before the deadline would help with his decision, Flake said he didn't know. 
   
   "When you have more time, you look at what more time has done in the past couple of days in term of ludicrous allegations, some of which have been recanted. Others just were anonymous to begin with, and what does that do to the accused. Just to give it more time. I don't know. You have to weigh those things, You have to weigh all those things." 
   
   GOP senators told reporters that members meeting behind closed doors said the committee vote would happen as previously scheduled Friday morning and that the first procedural vote will take place on the Senate floor Saturday. GOP leaders had pushed for a full Senate vote on Tuesday, October 2. 
   
   Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnnell would not confirm if he had the votes following a conference wide meeting Thursday night. 
   
   When asked if he was confident the nomination would advance out of committee, he replied: "well the next step is the committee will be voting in the morning." 
   
   He added, "We're optimistic, basically." 
   
   'We're meeting at 9:30' 
   
   Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Chuck Grassley declined to answer questions Thursday night from reporters as he repeatedly said, "we're meeting at 9:30" -- a reference to the committee meeting where the panel is scheduled to vote on whether to give Kavanaugh a favorable recommendation. 
   
   When asked by the media if the nomination will come to the full Senate floor for a vote, Grassley responded "Depends on what happens tomorrow." 
   
   Republicans can advance Kavanaugh's without any support from Democrats, but given their 51-49 seat majority in the chamber, Kavanaugh's supporters can only lose one vote and still advance his nomination. 
   
   Sen. John Cornyn, who as majority whip is the second-ranking GOP member in the chamber, expressed optimism following a Republican meeting Thursday night that Kavanaugh's nomination will be favorably reported out of the committee on schedule. 
   
   Asked if he is confident that Kavanaugh can advance out of the committee, he said, "I am optimistic, yes." 
   
   At least one long-undecided Republican senator, Bob Corker of Tennessee, announced his support for Kavanaugh just before 9 p.m. ET on Thursday night. 
   
   "While both individuals provided compelling testimony, nothing that has been presented corroborates the allegation," Corker said in his announcement. "There is no question that Judge Kavanaugh is qualified to serve on the Supreme Court, and in a different political environment, he would be confirmed overwhelmingly." 
   
   Four key senators meet 
   
   The meeting of Flake, Collins, Manchin and Collins occurred less than hour after Kavanaugh finished his testimony before the Judiciary Committee , where he forcefully and passionately maintained his innocence and defiantly challenged Democratic senators who grilled him on multiple allegations of inappropriate behavior. 
   
   On Thursday morning, that same committee heard from Ford, who she said was "100%" certain Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when they were teenagers in the 1980s. In Kavanaugh's testimony, he also said he was "100%" sure he did not sexual assault anyone. 
   
   Collins and Murkowski have appeared to be the most outspoken Republican senators in seeking additional investigation into the allegations of inappropriate behavior that have surfaced against Kavanaugh in recent days. 
   
   Multiple sources familiar with a private Wednesday meeting -- the night before the hearing -- told CNN that Collins appeared unnerved by the latest allegations, citing in particular that a sworn statement from accuser Julie Swetnick sent to the panel, which carries with it the possibility of perjury for lying to Congress. At that Wednesday meeting of Republican chairmen, GOP leaders tried to reassure Collins, keenly aware of the critical role she plays. 
   
   When asked by reporters earlier this week whether there should be a full FBI investigation into the allegations, Murkowski responded, "It would sure clear up all the questions, wouldn't it?" 
   
   On Thursday night, Murkowski said she was leaving to think over the nomination at home. 
   
   "I'm going to go home, have dinner and have a chance to think about all that's gone on today," Murkowski told reporters. 
   
   Manchin is up for re-election this fall in a state Donald Trump won overwhelmingly and supported Trump's last Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch. Manchin was among a handful of Democrats from red and purple states that Kavanaugh supporters were targeting as possible votes. 
   
   "We are still talking," Manchin told CNN leaving that meeting. "There are no decisions on anything. There are some concerns that people have and we're going to try to close the loop." ||||| "His testimony was powerful, honest, and riveting," President Donald Trump wrote on Twitter of his Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh's testimony. | Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images White House Trump thrilled at Kavanaugh defiance The president applauds a Trumpian defense from his nominee — but some White House allies are concerned by his accuser's 'credible' performance. 
   
   President Donald Trump and his aides were ebullient Thursday as Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh defiantly rejected charges of sexual misconduct — a mood that reflected some relief after Trump officials conceded that his accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, offered a compelling performance in the first half of the day. 
   
   Trump and senior officials were impressed by Kavanaugh’s combative defense before the Senate Judiciary Committee, in which the Trump nominee, alternating between fury and tears, called several misconduct charges against him a “calculated and orchestrated political hit” and “national disgrace” that had devastated his life and family. 
   
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   Minutes after the committee adjourned Thursday evening, Trump tweeted that his nominee "showed America exactly why I nominated him." 
   
   "His testimony was powerful, honest, and riveting," Trump wrote. "Democrats' search and destroy strategy is disgraceful and this process has been a total sham and effort to delay, obstruct, and resist. The Senate must vote!" 
   
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   That capped something of a roller-coaster day for a White House that had watched in the morning as Ford gave a powerful and disturbing account of what she said was a sexual assault by Kavanaugh when the two were high school students at a party in the 1980s. 
   
   "She seems sincere, kind, thoughtful and credible," a former Trump White House official said. "Hard to suggest she is politically motivated." 
   
   Trump, who watched the hearing aboard Air Force One on his flight back to Washington from New York City early in the day, refrained from tweeting until the day’s proceedings had ended shortly before 7:00 p.m. Some of his aides fretted early in the day as Trump watched CNN and Fox News commentary suggesting that Ford’s testimony — and what officials called a disappointing performance by a female prosecutor hired by Judiciary Committee Republicans to question her — might tip the balance against Kavanaugh’s troubled nomination. 
   
   Kavanaugh said he did not share his fiery opening remarks with anyone except a law clerk, and a White House official said his defiant tone when he initially addressed the committee after lunch caught many in the building by surprise. 
   
   But Trump was elated when Kavanaugh, whom he previously complained was not defending himself with enough force, lashed out at Democrats and the media for what Kavanaugh called casual character assassination. 
   
   One senior White House official said Kavanaugh seemed to have tapped into a key element of Trump’s own personal style: hit back hard and without apology. 
   
   “What do you like to drink, Senator?” Kavanaugh angrily asked one questioner, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.). 
   
   “I think he’s studied the way people around Donald Trump have been treated and he figured out a way to prevail,” said the official. The official confirmed that Trump had watched and relished Kavanaugh’s combative opening statement, which the official called “superb.” 
   
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   Some of Kavanaugh’s rhetoric also echoed comments of the president at a news conference the day earlier, in which Trump lambasted Democrats for allegedly manufacturing false allegations in what Trump called a “con job.” Both Trump and Kavanaugh also suggested that men accused of sexual misconduct had lost the presumption of innocence, and that higher principles of due process and public service were at stake. 
   
   The senior White House official added that Kavanaugh’s approach also echoed the defiant response of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who survived public charges of sexual harassment that played out during his nationally televised 1991 confirmation hearings. 
   
   It remained unclear by evening whether Kavanaugh’s nomination would survive an astonishing day that covered everything from alleged rape to drinking games, the geography of Bethesda, Maryland, and crass high school yearbook jokes. But the day’s end, the mood in the White House was considerably brighter than it had been earlier, when some officials cringed at the role of Arizona prosecutor Rachel Mitchell, who led the GOP side’s questioning of Ford. 
   
   “That’s a disaster,” said one administration official. The official argued that Republican lawmakers had erred by caving to the pressures of identity politics and hiring a woman to quiz Ford to avoid having an all-white male lineup of Republicans question her. 
   
   Trump allies also recognized the bad optics of a prosecutor seeming to interrogate a victim who even some committee Republicans later acknowledged had come across as sympathetic. Mitchell approached Ford with a patient tone, but seemed to be searching for holes in Ford’s story as she asked about her air travel — Ford has said the alleged assault left her claustrophobic and uncomfortable in airplanes — and who paid for and advised her to take a polygraph test. 
   
   Trump allies who want to see Kavanaugh confirmed also were concerned that Mitchell failed to poke any substantial holes in Ford's account or character that would make her story less believable. During her questioning, Mitchell herself acknowledged that the day's format — in which she was able to question Ford in five-minute intervals — was not an ideal way to assess an alleged victim's story. 
   
   But not all White House aides and officials were so unhappy about Ford’s testimony in the first half of the day. One White House official and another person close to the confirmation process noted that, despite emotional responses on TV and via social media to the day's hearing, the key audience is a limited number of Republican senators. They include Jeff Flake, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski. Those senators have expressed a desire for a no-drama, fair hearing, and the sources said they felt Mitchell was delivering that. 
   
   The two sources also noted that the hearing had failed to produce any new facts that might incriminate Kavanaugh. And midway through the 53-year-old judge’s testimony, he had made no obvious stumbles or admissions of wrongdoing. 
   
   Trump aides were “particularly impressed,” said one of the White House officials, when Kavanaugh told senators that his 10-year-old daughter had recently said at bedtime that she and her sister should pray for Ford. 
   
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   And after Sen. Lindsey Graham launched a dramatic tirade against committee Democrats who he said “want … to destroy this guy’s life,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders cheered him on via Twitter. White House aides said they felt Graham had articulated their own anger over the personal charges against Kavanaugh, including Graham’s charge, delivered at a near-shout, that “What you want to do is destroy this guy's life, hold this seat open, and hope you win in 2020.” 
   
   At least one conservative legal activist distributed talking points early in the day defending Mitchell and noting Ford conceded to her that she must have been given a ride to and from the party where she says Kavanaugh assaulted her but could not remember who might have done so. “Whoever drove [Ford] home doesn't exist," the activist argued. The talking points also noted that a polygraph test Ford took and passed could be invalid because it was administered around the time of her grandmother’s funeral. The talking points also noted that Mitchell had managed to prove that "there was no witness to support what she's alleging happened.” 
   
   At the day’s outset, Republicans expressed resignation that Kavanaugh had mishandled the situation from the beginning, by trying to portray himself as a choir boy instead of admitting that he drank heavily in high school, college and law school, as multiple classmates and yearbook entries have shown. A better strategy, White House officials conceded, would have been to admit he didn’t remember the assault described by Ford, but that he believed her story and issue her an apology. 
   
   White House officials said they saw his decision to sit for an interview with Fox News on Monday as a mistake. And that a better way to have handled the accusations would have been as Trump did after the release of the "Access Hollywood" tape in October 2016: a quick apology and then a forceful forging ahead. 
   
   “He feels for Brett, the person,” one person familiar with Trump’s thinking said early in the day, noting that Trump sees it as Kavanaugh’s job to defend his own name. 
   
   “When he’s accused, he punches back,” the person said. 
   
   By the day’s end, Kavanaugh had done the same — winning the president’s support, even if his nomination remained in the balance. 
   
   Christopher Cadelago contributed to this report. 
   
   CORRECTION: This article has been updated to correct the spelling of Sen. Whitehouse's name.
target: – President Trump was pleased with his Supreme Court nominee's performance before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, tweeting that Brett Kavanaugh "showed America exactly why I nominated him." Politico described the mood of Trump and his aides as "ebullient." Trump watched Kavanaugh's opening statement (which Politico calls "combative") and was pleased, an official said. "I think [Kavanaugh] studied the way people around Donald Trump have been treated, and he figured out a way to prevail," the official said. A source speaking to CNN during the hearing summed it up: "The only way to earn respect in Trumpworld is to brawl. And [Kavanaugh] is brawling." Following the hearing, three Republican senators (Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and Jeff Flake) and a Democratic one (Joe Manchin) met privately in an office at the Capitol, CNN reports, noting that the three Republicans are the wildcards for whether Kavanaugh will be confirmed.