The Home Ethics Committee discovered “substantial evidence” that former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) paid a 17-year-old highschool pupil for intercourse when he was 35, used illicit medicine like cocaine and ecstasy, and obstructed Congress’s investigation into his conduct.
These conclusions are available a extremely anticipated report launched Monday that capped the panel’s years-long, on-and-off investigation into the previous Florida congressman.
“The committee concluded there was substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House Rules, state and federal laws, and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, acceptance of impermissible gifts, the provision of special favors and privileges, and obstruction of Congress,” the report says.
Gatez has repeatedly denied having sexual contact with a minor and different wrongdoing. Final week, in anticipation of the report’s launch, Gaetz stated he had engaged in “embarrassing, though not criminal” previous conduct.
On Monday, he filed a last-minute lawsuit to dam the Ethics Committee from releasing the report.
“These claims would be destroyed in court — which is why they were never made in any court against me,” Gaetz instructed The Hill on Monday forward of the report’s launch, in reference to the Division of Justice declining to file prices after investigating Gatez for related issues.
Curiosity within the investigation reached its peak after President-elect Trump picked Gaetz to be legal professional basic, main him to abruptly resign from Congress simply earlier than the panel was as a consequence of launch the report. Amid opposition from GOP senators, Gaetz withdrew his title from consideration for AG the next week.
His exit from the Home set off a debate about whether or not it was applicable for the panel to take the uncommon, however not unprecedented, step of releasing its findings on a former member.
Home Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Visitor (R-Miss.) led dissenting members in an uncommon assertion criticizing the panel’s choice to interrupt with “long-standing practice” and launch the report on Gaetz.
The report offers considerably extra element and documentation about accusations which have swirled round Gaetz for years, together with testimony from the girl who was 17 years outdated on the time of the alleged 2017 sexual encounter with Gaetz.
The report didn’t discover that Gaetz had engaged in intercourse trafficking, despite the fact that it stated that Gaetz traveled with ladies that he paid for intercourse “on several occasions.”
The Division of Justice had additionally appeared into whether or not Gaetz violated intercourse trafficking legal guidelines associated to the 17-year-old and touring along with her throughout state traces, however in 2023 declined to cost Gaetz with a criminal offense. That probe stemmed from one other investigation of former Florida tax collector Joel Greenberg, who’s at present in jail for on prices together with intercourse trafficking of a minor and fraud, and had cooperated with the DOJ as a part of a plea settlement.
When the DOJ probe ended, nonetheless, the Ethics Committee booted up its investigation into Gaetz. The Home committee is empowered to research whether or not representatives or employees have violated the foundations and requirements of the Home, and has a lot totally different requirements than federal regulation enforcement businesses.
Gaetz has famous the totally different requirements of the inner Ethics committee versus a courtroom when defending himself, saying in a put up final week: “I NEVER had sexual contact with someone under 18. Any claim that I have would be destroyed in court – which is why no such claim was ever made in court.”
The Hill has reached out to Gaetz for touch upon the report launched Monday.
Report’s launch marks finish to drama on Capitol Hill
Monday’s launch of the report marks the tip of a weeks-long drama surrounding whether or not the panel, which generally conducts its work in secrecy would launch its findings.
The panel had been investigating Gaetz since 2021. However curiosity within the probe reached a fever pitch in November after Gaetz was nominated by President-elect Trump to be legal professional basic and resigned from the Home that day — a one-two step that got here days earlier than the committee was scheduled to satisfy and vote on whether or not to launch its report into the Florida Republican.
Gaetz in the end withdrew his title from consideration for legal professional basic days later amid opposition from GOP senators, then stated he wouldn’t take the oath of workplace for the 119th Congress.
Some in each events argued the committee ought to nonetheless launch the report, particularly in mild of his Cupboard nomination — and Democrats pushed for it even after he withdrew from consideration — whereas different Republicans contended that the nearly-finished report ought to by no means be launched since Gaetz was not a member of Congress.
The Ethics Committee doesn’t have jurisdiction over former members of Congress. Whereas uncommon, nonetheless, the panel has a number of occasions launched findings on former members — most not too long ago in 2006, when the panel launched the outcomes of its investigation into former Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.), specializing in the conduct of Home Republican leaders.
The talk over releasing the report divided the Ethics Committee. Whereas Democrats had been agency of their perception that the physique of labor ought to go public, Visitor, the panel’s chairman, publicly stated the findings mustn’t see the sunshine of day. In November, after Gaetz withdrew his title from consideration from legal professional basic, Visitor stated “I think that this should end the discussion of whether or not the Ethics Committee should continue to move forward in this matter.”
He stood agency in that place within the last report, writing an uncommon dissenting assertion that criticized the panel’s choice to launch the report on Gaetz. He stated he was writing on behalf of panel members “who do not support the release of the report,” however didn’t disclose who’s included in that group.
“While we do not challenge the Committee’s findings, we take great exception that the majority deviated from the Committee’s well-established standards and voted to release a report on an individual no longer under the Committee’s jurisdiction, an action the Committee has not taken since 2006,” the assertion stated.
Visitor’s assertion famous that Gaetz has stated he won’t return for the 119th Congress, which begins on Jan. 3, arguing that the break from “long-standing practice,” opens the panel to “undue criticism” and “will be viewed by some as an attempt to weaponize the Committee’s process.”
The panel took a vote to launch the report in November, which failed. Then a pair of Home Democrats pressured votes within the Home on resolutions that may have compelled the Ethics Committee to publish its physique of labor on Gaetz, however the chamber voted to refer the measures again to committee — torpedoing the hassle to disclose the findings.
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