Julia Louis-Dreyfus, a graduate of the all-girls private high school attended by Christine Blasey Ford, the woman accusing Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault decades ago, has signed a letter in support of her.
Louis-Dreyfus, a 1979 graduate of the Holton-Arms School in Bethesda, Maryland, tweeted Monday that she joins some 200 alumnae who stand with Ford, 51, a California research psychologist.
“We believe Dr. Blasey Ford and are grateful that she came forward to tell her story,” says the draft letter, according to the Huffington Post. “It demands a thorough and independent investigation before the Senate can reasonably vote on Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to a lifetime seat on the nation’s highest court.”
The graduates write that Ford’s alleged experience “is all too consistent with stories we heard and lived while attending Holton. Many of us are survivors ourselves.”
Kavanaugh, a student at the all-boys private school Georgetown Prep at the time of the alleged assault, denies the accusations.
In response to Ford’s accusations, made public this week in The Washington Post, the White House re-issued an earlier statement of Kavanaugh’s in which he wrote: “I categorically and unequivocally deny this allegation. I did not do this back in high school or at any time.”
Kavanaugh and Ford are scheduled to testify at a public hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee Monday, according to The New York Times.
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Sarah Burgess, a member of the Holten-Arms class of 2005, tells the Huffington Post that she signed the letter because she believes Ford’s story “will be scrutinized, and she will be accused of lying. However, I grew up hearing stories like hers, and believe her completely.”
The Washington Post reports that Ford is now subject to attacks from Kavanaugh supporters who claim she is politically motivated.
Ford had told The Washington Post that when she was 15, she went to a party that Kavanaugh, then 17, also attended. She recounted that an allegedly drunk Kavanaugh and a friend got her in a room, shut the door and turned up the music to muffle her protestations.
She alleged that Kavanaugh then held her down to a bed, groped her, grinded his body against hers and tried to take off her bathing suit, according to The Washington Post.
When Ford tried to scream, Kavanaugh held his hand over her mouth; she was only able to escape when the friend jumped on top of them, she alleged to The Post.
Ford’s attorney, Debra Katz, told the Today show: “She believes that if it were not for the severe intoxication of Brett Kavanaugh, she would have been raped.”