Judge Brett Kavanaugh is being advised by allies to mount an aggressive and proactive campaign to win over the swing-vote senators who will determine whether he is confirmed to the Supreme Court, even as the FBI undertakes a weeklong investigation of sexual assault allegations against him.

One White House official said Sunday that no new television appearances were currently planned for Kavanaugh, but that “anything to further his case will be done with senators and with the FBI” and that the possibility of appearances later in the week had not been ruled out.

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Friends, meanwhile, said they were encouraging Kavanaugh — whom one described as “shell-shocked” by the crisis engulfing his nomination fight — to continue playing offense, the way he did in his testimony on Thursday.

“I’d want people to see me this week,” one Republican close to the process said of Kavanaugh, noting that the aggressive stance he took last week as he faced off against Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee was at odds with his typically unemotional personality — but was responsible for his still having any fighting chance of confirmation.

The uncertainty surrounding the nomination has Republicans and Democrats alike headed into the week raising the stakes of its outcome to a make-or-break moment for their chances of victory in the midterm elections.

“There’s no walking this thing back,” Steve Bannon, the former chief White House strategist, said in an interview Sunday night. “You get Kavanaugh, you’re going to get turnout. You get turnout, you’re going to get victory. This is march or die.”

POLITICO spoke to five people inside and outside the White House involved with the Kavanaugh nomination process.

Democratic activists, meanwhile, reminded voters over the weekend to keep the pressure on three Republican senators — Jeff Flake of Arizona, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine — who they noted had so far agreed only to a delay but could still vote to confirm Kavanaugh.

The aggressive pro-Kavanaugh push, however, comes as White House officials and a separate, external war room that has been formed around Kavanaugh — including Bill Burck, a former counsel to President George W. Bush, as well as Leonard Leo, executive vice president of the Federalist Society — are fighting what some of them conceded to be an uphill battle in which time is not on their side.

“Seven days is an eternity,” said a Kavanaugh ally, noting a growing concern that phony allegations might surface. “No good things can happen to Kavanaugh in that time except for calling the vote.”

Another person involved in the nomination fight put the odds of Kavanaugh’s being confirmed as low as 50 percent. But, this person said, the White House could not afford to set a standard that would allow unsubstantiated allegations against a nominee to knock that person out of the running to sit on the nation’s highest court.

Democrats have set off their own alarms about the process. Democratic lawmakers have complained that the White House will seek to narrow the scope of the FBI investigation, and complained about the rushed time frame. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to the White House and the FBI on Sunday asking that the directive for the inquiry be released so that its breadth could be understood.

Also on Sunday, two days after the announcement of a new inquiry, Kavanaugh’s first accuser, Christine Blasey Ford, had not yet been contacted by the FBI, according to a member of her legal team.

Even former FBI Director James Comey, a critic of President Donald Trump but a Republican for most of his adult life, wrote in a New York Times op-ed on Sunday: “If truth were the only goal, there would be no clock, and the investigation wouldn’t have been sought after the Senate Judiciary Committee already endorsed the nominee.”

But on Sunday, one of the critical votes on Kavanaugh, Collins, said she had faith even in a shortened, politicized process. “I am confident that the FBI will follow up on any leads that result from the interviews,” she said in a statement to POLITICO.

The fear factor among Republicans who view Kavanaugh’s confirmation as critical to the party’s efforts to hold on to the House and the Senate in the midterm elections is the randomness of events that have affected his fate so far — and the sheer number of unknowns in the air.

For instance, Flake admitted in an interview with “60 Minutes” on Sunday that his mind was changed from voting “yes” on Kavanaugh to calling for the investigation because he happened to be confronted by two protesters in an elevator — a chance run-in, which happened to be caught on television, that could ultimately affect the outcome of the biggest political crisis the Trump presidency has yet to face.

“What I was seeing, experiencing, in an elevator and watching it in committee and just thinking, this is tearing the country apart,” Flake said in the interview. “They were clearly passionate and determined I hear them.”

White House surrogates said their strategy, however, was not to attack Flake for his flip-flop, for fear of his making another decision based on emotion.

There’s also concern among Kavanaugh’s allies about what jump balls the White House may unintentionally throw into the mix. When it comes to the crisis surrounding his Supreme Court pick, Trump appears to say whatever feels good for him to say in the moment, vacillating between strong support for Kavanaugh and expressions of support for the credibility of Ford’s claims against him.

“I thought her testimony was very compelling, and she looks like a very fine woman to me, very fine woman,” Trump said of Ford while speaking to reporters in the Oval Office on Friday. “Certainly she was a very credible witness. She was very good in many respects.”

When the president told reporters Saturday that the FBI had “free rein to do whatever they have to do” in its investigation of assault claims against Kavanaugh, the comment served as a terrifying reminder to the judge’s allies of how the president’s own off-hand remarks could accidentally tank a fragile situation.

That worry about disparate communications strategy was reinforced by White House counselor Kellyanne Conway’s personal revelation Sunday, that she, too, had been a victim of sexual assault. Many of her White House colleagues did not know she planned to share the personal detail, they said, but later said they supported her, even if the disclosure lent some support to Ford’s point that assault victims don’t always come forward right away.

And Kavanaugh’s outside team had not been briefed on the personal argument Conway planned to mount in her interview with CNN’s Jake Tapper, using her own experience to push back on the notion that Kavanaugh’s confirmation would send the message to victims that their stories didn’t matter.

“I’m a victim of sexual assault,” Conway said Sunday morning. “I don’t expect Judge Kavanaugh or Jake Tapper or Jeff Flake or anybody to be held responsible for that. You have to be responsible for your own conduct.”

Conway once disclosed that she had her own ‘me too’ moment, and following the release of the “Access Hollywood“ tape, she discussed the way young women would deal with aggressive behavior by men on the Hill. But she had not previously described her experience as an assault.

Some Republicans, however, said they were holding out hope that Kavanaugh would be confirmed because the fight would unify Republicans. One poll, commissioned by the conservative Judicial Crisis Network, was circulating among White House surrogates, showing that 58 percent of voters in West Virginia — where Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin, a crucial vote on the nominee, is in a tough reelection campaign against Republican candidate Patrick Morrisey — think Kavanaugh should be confirmed.

Burgess Everett and Elana Schor contributed to this report.

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau worked the phones, officials gathered at his office and Canadian stakeholders were called to Ottawa as negotiators came within striking distance of reaching a three-country NAFTA deal on Sunday.

People briefed on the potential new NAFTA described notable changes in dairy, the dispute resolution system, online shopping and the U.S. threat of auto tariffs.

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These late-stage negotiations are taking place primarily by phone. A public announcement of any new deal would occur late Sunday night, or possibly Monday, sources briefed on the talks said.

Any announced deal still must go through a number of procedural hurdles before it can be sent to Congress for a formal vote, which will not take place before the new Congress takes office in 2019.

But reaching a new deal would be a victory for the Trump administration, which has long sought to make its mark on trade policies. It would also give vulnerable Republicans up for reelection a policy achievement to highlight on the trail before the midterm elections.

Sources briefed on the talks said that several important changes would be included in a new deal, including:

— Dairy: An opening of the Canadian dairy market similar to the level of liberalization under the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which opened 3.25 percent of Canada’s market. However, two people familiar with the issue said it could be more significant in that it would do away with certain exceptions in TPP to the 3.25 percent liberalization. Limits are also expected on Canada’s Class 7 program for ultrafiltered milk products, a source of tension with U.S. farmers.

Any dairy changes are expected to receive political blowback in Quebec, the No. 1 dairy-producing province. As it happens, there’s a provincial election there Monday.

— Autos: Expect a Canadian exemption from auto tariffs in exchange for an import cap, according to two stakeholder sources and one Canadian official. But all three said it would be a flexible quota, allowing for growth in the industry. One person outside government pegged it at around 40 percent larger than current Canadian exports to the U.S.

Two sources said the issue is likely, but not certain, to find itself in a separate agreement and not in the main NAFTA text. Canada was seeking an arrangement that would punt the threat of hypothetical Section 232 tariffs into the future, beyond the term of Donald Trump, who has wielded the national security tariffs aggressively.

— Online shopping: Canada is ready to agree to a higher limit for imports to be duty free. This so-called de minimis level is currently Canadian $20. Two sources familiar with the issue said they expected the final number to resemble the $100 Mexico agreed to and remain far lower than the U.S.’ $800 level.

However, one source added an important caveat: The countries are haggling over specific details of the de minimis design, such as how much of it should include a tax exemption, in addition to a duty exemption. That source said the final details could mean a higher or lower dollar amount.

An increased de minimis level would mean cheaper online purchases for Canadians. However, critics argue it would damage Canadian retailers, who must charge sales taxes. The Canadian government also fears a loss in tax revenues.

— Dispute settlement: Sources briefed on the negotiations said the countries were discussing a way to preserve a version of the Chapter 19 dispute system for anti-dumping and countervailing duties, a top priority historically for Canada in its trade talks with the U.S. However, any future Chapter 19 system would come with limits, possibly including an expiration clause.

Trudeau called the heads of Canadian banks to seek their input. Top officials were seen entering the Prime Minister’s Office in casual weekend wear.

White House trade adviser Peter Navarro said an announcement on Canada’s status is coming by Monday morning: “You’ll have some news one way or the other that’ll be big, and perhaps market-moving,” Navarro told the Fox Business Network on Sunday.

“Everybody’s negotiating in good faith right now, as we speak. The deadline’s midnight tonight.”

He said several sticking points were still being worked out.

Some stakeholders sounded more emphatic. One said he was aware of industry representatives being convened to Ottawa to participate in a news conference to tout an expected deal.

Canadian officials have spent the weekend downplaying expectations that everything was settled. One senior Canadian official joked: “There’s a special place in hell for people who call a deal done before it’s done.”

Yet they all expressed varying degrees of optimism. “We are not there but getting close,” another official involved in the talks said late Saturday.

“My understanding is that the parties have reached an agreement in principle on nearly all major issues and are working on cleanup and timing of an announcement,” said Dan Ujczo, a trade lawyer at Dickinson Wright, who said he discussed developments with representatives of all three countries and stakeholders involved.

As Democrats and Republicans in Congress dig in for what could be the final chapter of Brett Kavanaugh’s tumultuous confirmation battle, both parties are pushing hard on behalf of an FBI investigation. Just not the same one.

Democrats, newly emboldened by a tenuous alliance forged with Sen. Jeff Flake, are banking on federal agents’ uncovering evidence to corroborate the accounts of several women who have leveled allegations of sexual misconduct against Kavanaugh over the past month.

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Republicans — gobsmacked by the eleventh-hour swerve from their Arizona colleague after navigating a near-fatal week for the president’s Supreme Court nominee — are grappling with the unexpected investigation by calling for a separate inquiry into Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee and their leader, Dianne Feinstein of California.

The stakes couldn’t be higher in the coming week on Capitol Hill. Lawmakers in “the world’s greatest deliberative body” are steeling for several days of intense debate over President Donald Trump’s besieged nominee that could not only shape the Supreme Court for decades to come, but also portend control of Congress and the very nature and scope of government in a deeply fractured political environment being shaped, in part, by the #MeToo movement.

Central to both parties’ strategies is a White House torn between the executive branch’s oversight responsibilities and the political impulses of a president determined to seat his second justice ahead of November’s midterm elections.

After Flake banded with Judiciary Committee Democrats on Friday in demanding an investigation of sexual assault allegations made by Christine Blasey Ford ahead of a full floor vote on Kavanaugh, Trump bowed, authorizing the bureau to reopen its background check into the federal judge.

But a Saturday report by NBC News, citing anonymous sources, indicated that the White House was limiting the scope of the FBI’s inquiry, and Trump throughout the weekend has sought to demonize Senate Democrats and goad Republicans seeking an investigation of Feinstein.

At a rally in West Virginia on Saturday, Trump lamented “the meanness” and “the anger” he said Democrats employed in the hope of quashing Kavanaugh’s nomination.

“The entire nation has witnessed the shameless conduct of the Democrat Party,” Trump told the crowd at WesBanco Arena in Wheeling. “They’re willing to throw away every standard of decency, justice, fairness and due process to get their way.”

Republicans have reserved the bulk of their rage for Feinstein, California’s senior senator, who they allege withheld Ford’s allegations against Kavanaugh for months in order to maximize the political effect on his confirmation fight.

“Remember her answer, ‘Did you leak the document?’” Trump said Saturday, before going on to pantomime Feinstein’s response to the accusation and mock her “really bad body language.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), who has emerged as Kavanaugh’s fiercest congressional defender, announced his intention on Sunday to call for an FBI investigation into Democrats’ handling of Ford’s allegations and their maneuvers during Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings — including whether Democrats leaked Ford’s confidential letter detailing her account, or recommended that Ford take on Debra Katz, a civil rights lawyer and Trump critic, to represent her.

“We’re going to do a wholesale, full-scale investigation of what I think was a despicable process to deter from happening again,” Graham said in an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”

Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) issued a similar threat Sunday.

“Dianne Feinstein and her staff is going to face an investigation for why they leaked that,” Cotton said in an interview on CBS’ “Face The Nation,” claiming that Feinstein and the panel’s Democrats “betrayed” Ford by not sharing her letter with Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and other Republicans sooner.

But journalist Ryan Grim, who first reported on the letter Ford sent to lawmakers, has stated on Twitter that Feinstein’s staff did not leak the letter or news of its existence to The Intercept, Grim’s publication. Graham also said Sunday that he accepted Feinstein’s denial but did not necessarily believe her staff was innocent.

Democrats, meanwhile, have been sounding the alarm over a White House that they fear has been inappropriately constraining the FBI as it seeks to chase down details from Kavanaugh’s time in high school and college.

“I’m very concerned about this because the White House should not be allowed to micromanage an FBI investigation,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), a member of the Judiciary Committee, said Sunday in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Sen. Mazie Keiko Hirono (D-Hawaii) echoed that message.

“To limit the FBI as to the scope and who they’re going to question, that really — I wanted to use the word farce, but that’s not the kind of investigation that all of us are expecting the FBI to conduct,” she said in an interview on ABC’s “This Week.”

In a tweet late Saturday evening, Trump moved to rebut reports of meddling by the West Wing in the FBI’s work.

“NBC News incorrectly reported (as usual) that I was limiting the FBI investigation of Judge Kavanaugh, and witnesses, only to certain people,” the president wrote online. “Actually, I want them to interview whoever they deem appropriate, at their discretion. Please correct your reporting!”

Despite those claims of interference, the bureau’s investigation appears to be broadening beyond just Ford’s accusations. Deborah Ramirez, who has accused Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct during their time at Yale University in the 1980s, confirmed Saturday through her attorney that she was cooperating with the FBI in its inquiry.

But Julie Swetnick, Kavanaugh’s third accuser, has not yet been contacted by the FBI, her attorney, Michael Avenatti, told POLITICO on Saturday. Avenatti is also the lawyer for the adult-film actress Stormy Daniels in her lawsuit against the president.

Swetnick has alleged that Kavanaugh was present at house parties in the Washington area in the early 1980s where women were plied unknowingly with alcohol and drugs. She claims she was raped by multiple boys at one such gathering.

“If they do not conduct an investigation into my client’s claims, it will cast significant doubt as to the legitimacy of the investigation as a whole,” Avenatti said. “You can’t possibly do an appropriate investigation without talking with her.”

White House counselor Kellyanne Conway, in an interview Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union,” emphasized that the FBI’s Kavanaugh inquiry would be “limited in scope” and was “not meant to be a fishing expedition.” But she could not confirm whether the White House counsel, Don McGahn, had clamped down on the interviews agents could conduct.

“I have not talked to him about it, let me make clear,” Conway said. “But he would not — we’re not trying to interfere. It’s the president who is saying, ‘Go ahead.’”

Before departing for West Virginia on Saturday, Trump said FBI officials had “free rein” to pursue whatever leads they desire to uncover the truth, according to a press pool report.

“They can do whatever they have to do, whatever it is that they do,” the president said. “They’ll be doing things we have never even thought of. And hopefully, at the conclusion, everything will be fine.”

But by Sunday afternoon, the president was back on Twitter, criticizing Democrats’ demands for a more thorough investigation of the allegations against the man who could help enshrine conservative jurisprudence for a generation.

“Wow! Just starting to hear the Democrats, who are only thinking Obstruct and Delay, are starting to put out the word that the ‘time’ and ‘scope’ of FBI looking into Judge Kavanaugh and witnesses is not enough. Hello!” the president wrote online, appending a preview of the drama sure to play out this week in Washington and ensnare all three branches of the federal government: “For them, it will never be enough — stay tuned and watch!”