Letter Alleging Decades-Old Sexual Misconduct Incident Adds Fuel To Fiery Partisan Debate Over Kavanaugh

The Washington Post: Bitter Senate Fight To Confirm Kavanaugh Plunges Deeper Into Chaos Over Letter
The bitter Senate fight to confirm Brett M. Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court plunged into deeper chaos Thursday as a top Democrat disclosed she had referred “information” about President Trump’s nominee to the FBI. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) issued a brief, cryptic statement about the referral, but the absence of any details only raised questions. The information came in a letter that describes an alleged episode of sexual misconduct involving the 53-year-old Kavanaugh when he was in high school, according to a person familiar with the matter. (Kim and Viebeck, 9/13)

Los Angeles Times: Feinstein Asks FBI To Review Letter Involving Supreme Court Nominee Brett Kavanaugh
Several Democrats on the committee declined to talk about the contents of the letter on Thursday after a hearing in which a vote on Kavanaugh’s nomination was slated for Sept. 20. It was unclear whether they had seen it. Anyone can make a referral to the FBI and it does not mean Kavanaugh is under federal investigation. Kavanaugh’s nomination is under intense scrutiny by Democrats who argue he would be the fifth solid conservative justice on the Supreme Court, a lock for Republican priorities such as scaling back abortion rights. (Haberkorn, 9/13)

The Washington Post: Senate Committee Delays Vote On Kavanaugh Nomination Until Next Week
The Senate Judiciary Committee delayed its vote on Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh until next week, as the deeply bitter fight over his confirmation intensified and a handful of moderate senators continued to deliberate privately over whether to support him. (Kim, 9/13)

In other national health care news —

Stat: Trump Wants Drug Prices In TV Ads. The Latest Roadblock? Republicans 
President Trump’s splashiest idea for lowering the cost of prescription drug prices was to force pharmaceutical companies to include the prices of their products in TV and other advertisements. But when Capitol Hill had a chance Thursday to help him achieve that goal, lawmakers failed. And counterintuitively, it was House members in the president’s own party who ultimately nixed the provision. In fact, it was a Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, pushing the measure hardest. (Florko, 9/13)

The New York Times/ProPublica: Top Sloan Kettering Cancer Doctor Resigns After Failing To Disclose Industry Ties
Dr. José Baselga, the chief medical officer of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, resigned on Thursday amid reports that he had failed to disclose millions of dollars in payments from health care companies in dozens of research articles. The revelations about Dr. Baselga’s disclosure lapses, reported by The New York Times and ProPublica last weekend, have rocked Memorial Sloan Kettering, one of the nation’s leading cancer centers, in recent days. Its top executives scrambled to contain the fallout, including urgent meetings of physician leaders and the executive committee of its board of directors. (Thomas and Ornstein, 9/13)

The New York Times: Cuban Experts Insist No Proof Exists Of Attack On Diplomats
Some of Cuba’s top scientists and medical specialists denounced on Thursday claims that two dozen American diplomats in Havana had been the targets of mysterious attacks over the last two years. The experts were careful not to offer a definitive explanation for the episodes, in which the diplomats reported hearing strange noises that led to symptoms similar to those after a minor traumatic brain injury or a concussion. (Harris, 9/13)

Stat: Here’s The Data Behind The New Apple Watch EKG App 
When the new Apple Watch heart monitoring app can get a reading, it can accurately detect that a person has an irregular heart rhythm known as atrial fibrillation 99 percent of the time, according to a study of the new device that Apple submitted to the Food and Drug Administration. ...In one study, Apple tested the watch in more than 580 people, half of whom had atrial fibrillation. The app couldn’t read about 10 percent of the heart rhythm recordings in the study. When it looked at the rest, though, the app was very accurate: It caught more than 98 percent of people with atrial fibrillation, and correctly told people that they didn’t have the condition 99.6 percent of the time. (Sheridan, 9/13)

Reuters: Amazon's Jeff Bezos Commits $2 Billion To Help Homeless, Pre-Schools
Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com Inc's founder and the world's richest person, said on Thursday he will commit $2 billion (1.5 billion pounds) to helping homeless families and starting pre-schools for low-income communities. The announcement marks a deeper foray into philanthropy for Bezos, whose fortune has soared to more than $160 billion thanks to his stake in Amazon. Dominance in e-commerce and the nascent field of cloud computing has made Amazon the world's second-most valuable public company. (9/13)