The New York Times admitted Tuesday it was a mistake to allow an opinion writer who had badmouthed Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh on Twitter to help report a scoop on how Kavanaugh was questioned by police after a bar fight in the 1980s.

Emily Bazelon, who writes for New York Times Magazine, gathered documents for the piece published Monday evening, and got a co-byline with Ben Protess. The report detailed how Kavanaugh was blamed for throwing ice on another man “for an unknown reason.”

[Click here for complete Kavanaugh coverage]

The piece attracted scrutiny after Bazelon's critical tweets about Kavanaugh from July resurfaced.

“Emily Bazelon is a writer for The New York Times Magazine who occasionally writes op-eds for the opinion section,” a New York Times spokesperson said, according to Mediaite. “She is not a news reporter. Her role in this story was to help colleagues in the newsroom gather public documents in New Haven, where Emily is based. In retrospect, editors should have used a newsroom reporter for that assignment. To be clear, the story is straightforward, fact-based, and we fully stand behind it.”

A New York Times spokesperson also told the Washington Examiner that the story was "straightforward" and based on public documents.

White House press secretary Sarah Sanders was among the those people who criticized the Times for allowing Bazelon to help write the piece.

[Opinion: New York Times’ dud of a Kavanaugh bombshell co-authored by admitted anti-Kavanaugh partisan]

“As a @YaleLawSch grad & lecturer, I strongly disassociate myself from tonight’s praise of Brett Kavanaugh. With respect, he’s a 5th vote for a hard-right turn on voting rights and so much more that will harm the democratic process & prevent a more equal society,” Bazelon tweeted in July. “Those are fundamental values we try to instill in our students. They matter more than collegiality and credentials.”

Kavanaugh has denied all of the allegations of sexual misconduct from multiple women. The full Senate is waiting on a confirmation vote until the FBI concludes a supplemental background investigation.