As assistant counsel to President George H.W. Bush, Mark Paoletta played a role in the 1991 Senate confirmation hearings for the nomination of Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court.
But he’s taking on a new role when it comes to the upcoming HBO movie about the hearings starring Kerry Washington as Anita Hill, the woman who accused Thomas of sexual harassment: Paoletta is now leading an effort to fact-check the flick. Today he launched confirmationbiased.com, a website he thinks will combat what he calls the pro-Hill “false narratives” in the movie, with documents, video footage and other content about the real-life hearings. (Washington and HBO brass say it’s not biased against Thomas.)
While some other Republicans involved in the hearings have preemptively bashed it, Paoletta says his complaint isn’t just a drive-by one — he plans to “devote himself” to correcting the record.
25 years later, the Thomas-Hill affair is still a “he said-she said.” Will we ever know the real truth? Probably not.
