What the F.B.I. Found (and Didn’t Find)

[0] From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro.

[1] This is the Daily.

[2] Today, the FBI delivers its report about Brett Kavanaugh to the U .S. Senate.

[3] Republicans say it reveals nothing new.

[4] Democrats say it was designed to reveal nothing new.

[5] Where that leaves the confirmation process.

[6] It's Friday, October 5th.

[7] In the middle of the night, at about 2 .30, in the morning Thursday, this much -anticipated report, the FBI investigation into whether or not Judge Brett Kavanaugh committed sexual assault makes its way to the White House.

[8] And there's just one copy of this report.

[9] And it gets sent over to Capitol Hill, and it winds up in this secure room, this room that's called a skiff, sensitive, compartmented, information facility that is an underground room and the public can't go in.

[10] There are these huge kind of brass looking doors with signs on them that say, you know, no media or public.

[11] And this is where the senators review classified information.

[12] And this report is being treated like classified information.

[13] Cheryl Gay -Stolberg covers Congress for the Times.

[14] So the plan is that at 8 o 'clock in the morning, Republican aides and the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Charles Grassley of Iowa, are going to be able to go in this room for an hour and review this report.

[15] And then at 9 o 'clock, the top Democrat on the committee, Senator Diane Feinstein, and her aides, can go in and view this report.

[16] This is going to go on and on all day long with Republicans and Democrats alternating hour by hour in and out of this room reviewing this single document.

[17] This system doesn't seem especially efficient, and actually it sounds kind of odd.

[18] It does sound kind of odd, but the whole day up here has been really kind of surreal.

[19] So I arrived at about 7 .45 in the morning, and the first.

[20] The first thing I did was I dropped my computer off in the Senate Press Gallery, where I have this microscopic little desk that looks out.

[21] At least I have a window, though.

[22] It's great.

[23] I have a window, which is really a prize thing in the Capitol.

[24] But I ditched my computer, and then I went downstairs to the basement.

[25] You make kind of a right -hand turn.

[26] You can go into the visitor's center and down another set of winding stairs to where this skiff is.

[27] And by the time I...

[28] The secure room.

[29] And by the time I got there, the place was already crowded with reporters.

[30] And it was clear that, you know, this kind of bizarre scene was going to be unfolding all day with more and more senators arriving, more and more reporters and photographers, and just a lot of commotion.

[31] And Cheryl, once the senators actually make it past the media, and they get into the secure room, room.

[32] What are they looking at exactly?

[33] What's the process inside that room?

[34] Michael, if I knew the answer to that, I'd get a pay raise.

[35] You know, it's so secretive that no one would tell us.

[36] But I did find out the documents were 46 pages of interviews and the FBI tried to reach 10 witnesses, they got nine, nine of those 46 pages were devoted to Mark Judge.

[37] But as to what it actually looked like, we don't know, and they were so cautious that, you know, they wouldn't even describe that kind of act of how did they all look at this, you know, single document.

[38] Have you determined how you're going to vote?

[39] I know.

[40] You got to get a path.

[41] So there's A big buzz when they walk out, and reporters are peppering them with questions, and some of them...

[42] Senator White House?