US Senate Judiciary Committee Chuck Grassley has granted a deadline extension to a woman accusing Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault to decide if and how she will testify.
The Senate Judiciary Committee had delayed a vote on Kavanaugh's confirmation after California professor Christine Blasey Ford's allegations emerged last week, and her lawyers and committee staff were negotiating the conditions of her testimony.
"Judge Kavanaugh I just granted another extension to Dr. Ford to decide if she wants to proceed (with) the statement she made last week to testify to the Senate," Grassley wrote on Twitter.
"She should decide so we can move on. I want to hear her. I hope you understand. It's not my normal approach to be indecisive."
Grassley did not say if a new deadline had been set.
Grassley earlier in the day said the panel would hold a vote on Kavanaugh's confirmation on Monday unless a deal was reached with Ford's lawyers midday (AEST) on Saturday.
In an email to judiciary committee staff, Ford's lawyer Debra Katz called the deadline arbitrary.
"The imposition of aggressive and artificial deadlines regarding the date and conditions of any hearing has created tremendous and unwarranted anxiety and stress on Dr. Ford," Katz wrote.
"Your cavalier treatment of a sexual assault survivor who has been doing her best to cooperate with the Committee is completely inappropriate."
Earlier on Friday, Trump sought to cast doubt on Ford's allegation that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her in 1982 when both were high school students in Maryland.
Kavanaugh has denied the allegation and pledged to testify at Monday's hearing.
The Republican-controlled Senate judiciary panel has struggled on how to proceed with Kavanaugh's nomination. Democrats have demanded more time for scrutiny, and Republicans want to move ahead quickly with a confirmation vote in an increasingly volatile political climate ahead of the November 6 congressional elections.
Approval of Kavanaugh would cement conservative control of the Supreme Court and advance a White House effort to tilt the American judiciary farther right.
Trump and the White House had been careful not to malign Ford after her allegations surfaced, but Trump dropped the restraint in his tweets on Friday.
"I have no doubt that, if the attack on Dr. Ford was as bad as she says, charges would have been immediately filed with local Law Enforcement Authorities by either her or her loving parents," Trump said. "I ask that she bring those filings forward so that we can learn date, time, and place!
"Judge Brett Kavanaugh is a fine man, with an impeccable reputation, who is under assault by radical left wing politicians who don't want to know the answers, they just want to destroy and delay," Trump wrote.
Australian Associated Press
