By Valerie Richardson - The Washington Times - Wednesday, September 26, 2018

If you blinked, you might have missed the so-called fifth accusation against Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, the one involving a boat in Rhode Island, which was recanted shortly after it surfaced.

The Senate Judiciary Committee released a transcript Wednesday of a conference call in which Judge Kavanaugh was asked about an allegation raised by Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, Rhode Island Democrat.

Mr. Whitehouse informed the committee that a constituent contacted him Monday and told him that a close acquaintance “was sexually assaulted by two heavily inebriated men she referred to at the time as Brett and Mark” in August 1985 on a 36-foot boat in Newport, Rhode Island.

The constituent said he and another man scuffled at the time with “Brett and Mark,” but it was not until this week that he “realized that one of the men was Brett Kavanaugh when he saw Kavanaugh’s high school yearbook photo on television over the weekend,” according to the transcript.

In the Tuesday interview, Judge Kavanaugh emphatically denied the claim, as well as a fourth allegation stemming from an anonymous complaint to Sen. Cory Gardner, Colorado Republican, that accused the judge of shoving a woman drunkenly against a wall in 1989.

“I was not in Newport, haven’t been on a boat in Newport. Not with Mark Judge on a boat, nor all those three things combined,” Judge Kavanaugh said. “This is just completely made up, or at least not me. I don’t know what they’re referring to.”

DOCUMENT: Senate Judiciary Committee transcript of phone call from Brett Kavanaugh accuser

The constituent’s name was redacted, but the committee staffer conducting the Kavanaugh interview enabled reporters to track down the Twitter account.

The staffer read to Judge Kavanaugh two tweets that matched tweets by @JeffreyCatala16.

The account, much of which included semi-coherent rants against President Trump calling him a “domestic terrorist” and “Bozo” and accused him of “manslaughter,” recanted the allegation Wednesday and apologized.

“[T]o everyone who is going crazy about what I had said I have recanted because I have made a mistake and apologize for such mistake,” said the account with the location Tiverton, Rhode Island.

Multiple news organizations reported the allegations after the transcript was released, while others said the Rhode Island account appeared to be a bot, or fake account.

The account, which was started in June, identified the holder as a “Graphic Artist, Artist, photography and writer. Hippie, First Responder, Father and Grandpa and proud of it.”

• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.

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