Klobuchar says she approached senate judiciary hearings with 'civility' this week

Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar is now back in Minnesota after last week's tense senate judiciary hearing.

She says she was stunned by a number of things Thursday, one of those things being the way Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh shot back at her after she asked him a question she says was relevant to the hearing.

“Now, we all know we are pretty polarized right now, were not naïve about that, but this is about the U.S. Supreme Court, the highest court of the land,” Klobuchar told Fox 9 Sunday morning.

One of the tensest moments happened Thursday during an exchange between senator Klobuchar and Judge Kavanaugh.  

In that exchange, Klobuchar asked him, “Have you ever drank so much you couldn’t remember what happened? Or part of what happened?”

The exchange then went as follows:

Kavanaugh: “You’re talking about blackout? I don’t know… have you?”

Klobuchar: “Can you please answer the question judge?”

Kavanaugh: “I’m curious, have you?”

Klobuchar: “I don’t have a drinking problem, judge.”

Kavanaugh: “Neither do I.”

“I don’t know if he was surprised about the blackouts, but all I was trying to do was reconcile what was her very compelling testimony with what he was saying,” Klobuchar said Sunday morning.

“I decided to simply say, ‘Please answer the question,’ because no matter how hot things get in the hearing, I think my job is to approach things with civility, otherwise everyone is just yelling each other all the time,” she added.

Klobuchar says one of the turning points of the hearing last week came after she spoke with Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake, who reversed course and forced Republicans to delay a vote on Kavanaugh’s nomination for a brief FBI investigation.

“This happens, and what was really concerning to me is because of all the polarization we weren’t even following a normal protocol,” Klobuchar said. “And I am really glad that that happened. And now the FBI has got to be allowed to do their jobs.”

Klobuchar says now she hopes the White House will let the FBI do its job, and not micromanage.

She says this is not a criminal investigation and is just part of a routine background check that happens with every nomination.