The Senate Judiciary Committee will take sexual-assault allegations against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh “step by step,” committee chairman Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said Wednesday.

“These charges of sexual harassment are very important that they be looked into,” Grassley told reporters on Wednesday.

This comes after Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who accused Kavanaugh of sexual assault, decided she will not appear in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee in a public hearing scheduled for Monday.

According to a letter to Grassley from Ford’s legal team Tuesday, she has been the target of harassment and death threats, which has led to Ford and her family relocating from their home. Her lawyers also noted her email was hacked and she has been impersonated online.

“You and your staff scheduled a public hearing for her to testify at the same table as Judge Kavanaugh in front of two dozen U.S. senators on national television to relive this traumatic and harrowing incident,” Ford’s legal team wrote to Grassley. “The hearing was scheduled for six short days from today and would include interrogation by senators who appear to have made up their minds that she is ‘mistaken’ and ‘mixed up.’”

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Grassley said the hearing was scheduled as a way to allow both parties to answer questions from committee members.

“We got to take these examples of sexual assault very seriously, and she’s charged him, and we also have a request from Kavanaugh that he wants to give his side of the story,” Grassley told reporters.

In the letter, Ford, a professor at Palo Alto University and Stanford University, called for an investigation by the FBI into her allegations that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her when the two attended the same Georgetown prep school in Maryland. Kavanaugh has denied the allegations.

The committee is investigating the accusations to determine the credibility of Ford’s allegations against Kavanaugh, Grassley said. He noted he believed including the FBI in the investigation would not be the right course of action as the parties involved in the alleged assault are known.

Grassley criticized Democratic senators, including Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., for withholding the identity of Kavanaugh’s accuser, saying, “it’s too bad we lost six weeks.”

“A proper investigation must be completed, witnesses interviewed, evidence reviewed, and all sides spoken to. Only then should the chairman set a hearing date,” Feinstein said in a Tuesday press release.

Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, said in an email to *The Daily Iowan* she is confident in the investigation process led by Grassley.

RELATED: Grassley confident in Kavanaugh confirmation

“I believe that Dr. Ford has a right to be heard, and I have confidence in Senator Grassley’s work to properly investigate and take the appropriate next steps to ensure the process remains fair and all parties are heard,” Ernst said.

In an interview with Radio Iowa, Ernst noted she is withholding judgement on Kavanaugh until she learns more information.

“I can’t say whether the source is credible or not credible. I don’t know that, but I do believe that if she is accusing him of something so egregious, she needs to be heard,” Ernst told Radio Iowa in a report published Tuesday.