Brett Kavanaugh meets with Senator Claire McCaskill in August. (Photo by Senator Claire McCaskill)

Brett Kavanaugh meets with Senator Claire McCaskill in August. (Photo by Senator Claire McCaskill)

Brett Kavanaugh is on his second day of Senate hearings for his nomination to the Supreme Court of the United States, and he’s heavily emphasized his proximity to Washington D.C. in explaining a judicial decision about guns.

When questioned by California Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, about a 2011 dissent in which he argued that D.C.’s assault weapons ban was unconstitutional, Kavanaugh pointed to his long history in the District.

“I’m a native of this area,” he said. “I’m a native of an urban-suburban area. I grew up in a city plagued by gun violence and gang violence and drug violence.”

Kavanaugh, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, was indeed born in D.C. in 1965. His mom was a high school teacher at McKinley Tech High School, which he described as “east of the park” in his opening statement. (For much of last century, Rock Creek Park served to separate D.C. residents by more than mere geography, with “west of the park” signaling white wealth and anything east meaning black.)

But Kavanaugh was raised in nearby Bethesda, much more on the suburban than urban side of the “urban-suburban area.” He graduated from Georgetown Preparatory School in North Bethesda in 1983, and alumni of the school have rallied behind his appointment. The Washington Post describes his as “a résumé brimming with elite Washington titles,” even as he lives on the Maryland side of Chevy Chase.

Some viewers of the hearing have raised their eyebrows at the thought that Kavanaugh would describe his upbringing as one situated in the midst of urban violence.

In what is surely a sign that Kavanaugh is a “native of this area,” though, he did rack up tens of thousands of dollars in debt buying Washington Nationals tickets.

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