ATLANTA -- U.S. Senator David Perdue slammed Democratic members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Friday, after their actions in protest of the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.
The senators walked out of the hearings on Friday, just one day after listening to testimony from both the Supreme Court justice hopeful and the woman accusing him of sexually assaulting her in 1982, Christine Ford. Perdue said that their intention wasn't to support the accuser, however, but rather to play politics ahead of a midterm election.
"It is clear that Senate Democrats’ demands for an FBI investigation are nothing more than an orchestrated effort to cause a delay and push this decision past the election in November," he said.
He added that, "in America, the presumption of innocence until proven guilty is a cornerstone of our democracy" and that "no corroborating evidence has been presented to support these accusations."
President Donald Trump selected Kavanaugh in July as his nomination to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy. After that nomination, both Perdue and longtime Georgia Senator Johnny Isakson held one-on-one meetings with Kavanaugh in July.
Prior to the nomination, Isakson had no issue with any of the judges on Trump's shortlist for the seat on the Supreme Court - including the now-embattled nominee.
"We have four people being chosen from, all who appear to be very good people, very good choices," he said. "So we don't need to quibble over the final choice. We need to get the votes together to get the votes to get that confirmation done."
PHOTOS: Kavanaugh-Ford hearing in the Senate
After his meeting with Kavanaugh, Isakson, in a statement on July 17, wrote:
"Judge Kavanaugh has a strong record of applying the law as it is written without regard to his personal views, which is exactly what a judge should do. I look forward to his testimony before the Senate Committee on the Judiciary."
Looking back through previous Supreme Court confirmations, Perdue and Isakson have only voted along party lines.
Perdue joined the U.S. Senate in 2015. He voted in favor of Trump's only other nomination, Justice Neil Gorsuch. Isakson has been in the Senate for the confirmation of five justices. He missed the confirmation vote for Gorsuch due to surgery. He voted against President Barack Obama's picks of Elana Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor. He voted to confirm President George W. Bush's selections of justices Samuel Alito and John Roberts.
Now, with Kavanaugh, both senators will have another chance to weigh-in. But their votes may have to wait. Kavanaugh was narrowly approved Friday afternoon moving him a step closer to the Supreme Court.
But, in an unexpected move just before the vote, GOP Senator Jeff Flake said he wants to delay the final full Senate vote for a week to give the FBI time to investigate the allegations.
"I will only be comfortable moving on the floor until the FBI has done more investigation than they have already," he said.
So far, there's no indication that senators Isakson or Perdue would vote against confirming Kavanaugh. 11Alive reached out to both on Friday to see if they wanted to speak further on Thursday's testimony, but neither commented.
Isakson did release a statement in his own newsletter around 7:30 p.m. that he continues "to believe that Judge Kavanaugh is an experienced and qualified nominee, but I will ultimately make my decision ... based on the totality of the information provided during his confirmation process."
