*By Carlo Versano*
Day one of Brett Kavanaugh's Senate confirmation hearings got off to a raucous start Tuesday: protesters interrupted the proceedings, Democrats called for an adjournment, and Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said he'd never before seen a hearing "led by mob rule."
It took seven hours before the nominee could deliver his opening statement.
The tactics, while good fodder for television, are unlikely to be very effective for Democrats, said Erin Delmore, a senior political correspondent for Bustle. They also reveal the level of Democrats' desperation, she said Tuesday in an interview on Cheddar.
"It does show you how weak their hand is here," she said.
Democrats, in a futile effort to delay the hearing, were responding to growing frustrations from their base that the party has not been vocal enough in protesting the successor to Anthony Kennedy. If Kavanaugh, a staunch Republican, is confirmed, he may well tilt the court's ideology right-ward for at least a generation, as he'd replace a man who often acted as a swing vote on landmark decisions.
Justice Kennedy authored the majority opinions for [*Lawrence v. Texas*](https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/539/558/), which lifted the state's ban on sodomy, and 2013's [*Windsor v. U.S.*](http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/windsor-v-united-states-2/), the landmark decision that granted same-sex couples the right to marry in certain states.
The ever-polarizing *Roe v. Wade* is among the cases Kavanaugh's vote could turn. He has been asked about where he stands on choice by several moderate female senators, including Susan Collins (R-ME) and Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), who both said Kavanaugh told them he considered Roe to be "settled law."
The key question is, "does he believe *Roe v. Wade* was settled correctly," said Delmore. That's one interrogative he's unlikely to answer in this hearing.
"If \[Collins and Murkowski\] seem like this is enough for them, then this is over," Delmore said, referring to the chance that Kavanaugh could not be confirmed.
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/the-women-who-will-determine-brett-kavanaughs-fate).
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know.
Megyn Kelly is not a morning person ー at least, not anymore. Reports on Thursday morning indicated that the anchor's days as an NBC host are numbered, following her controversial on-air comments earlier this week that defended wearing blackface on Halloween.
China is responding to a revelatory report in The New York Times ー that said Chinese spies are allegedly eavesdropping on President Donald Trump during calls he makes on an unsecured iPhone ー by suggesting that the president use the device of a Chinese competitor instead.
Two more suspicious devices were intercepted on Thursday ー one in Delaware en route to former VP Joe Biden and the other at the restaurant and office of actor Robert De Niro in Lower Manhattan ー the eighth and ninth to be sent to high-profile critics of President Trump in a period of three days.
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know.
Investors overseas are losing their appetite for U.S. debt. Foreign buyers now hold 41 percent of outstanding Treasury debt, marking their lowest share in 15 years. If the trend continues, the U.S. dollar may weaken and interest rates might climb. While it may be easy to blame the trade war for the drop, Daniel Kruger, a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, said a stronger dollar is the culprit.
An apparent attempted mail bombing of several prominent Democrats and members of the news media used techniques that have grown more common among terrorists in recent years, said Jarrod Bernstein, a former counter-terrorism official in the Obama administration.
A record number of women are running for political office, and one congresswoman thinks America has one man to thank. "The best recruiter we've had, his name is President Donald Trump," Rep. Lois Frankel (D-FL) said Wednesday in an interview on Cheddar.
Tesla shares are surging as investors prepare for the company to release quarterly earnings Wednesday after the markets close. President Trump criticized Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell (again) in an interview with the Wall Street Journal. And Kerry Bishé and Corey Stoll join Cheddar to talk about their roles on Amazon's new series 'The Romanoffs.'
Apple CEO Tim Cook made his most forceful comments yet on the privacy concerns plaguing the tech industry, telling a conference in Brussels, Belgium that a "data-industrial complex" has led to eroding privacy rights around the world. Cook then called on the U.S. to adopt a landmark federal privacy law like the GDPR that went into effect earlier this year in the EU.
