Matt Gaetz paid thousands of dollars for sex and drugs, US House ...

14 hours ago

The Irish Times

Former Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz paid tens of thousands of dollars to women for drugs and sex that were violations of a series of House rules and included obstruction of Congress, the US House of Representatives’ Ethics Committee said in a report released on Monday.

Among the committee findings were that Gaetz paid $90,000 to 12 women, a substantial portion of which the panel found was likely for either sexual activity or drug use.

Gaetz, who has denied wrongdoing, resigned from the House of Representatives last month after he was selected by president-elect Donald Trump to be attorney general. He withdrew from consideration in the face of an uphill confirmation battle in the Senate.

The release of the report came despite a last-minute legal challenge from Gaetz in federal court in Washington, DC, in which he argued that the ethics panel no longer had jurisdiction after Gaetz resigned from Congress.

That did not stop the committee from its decision to make the 37-page report public.

“The committee determined there is substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House rules and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, impermissible gifts, special favors or privileges, and obstruction of Congress,” the report stated in its conclusion.

While Gaetz was found to have been involved in transporting women across state lines for the purposes of commercial sex, the panel said it did not find evidence that any of the women were under 18 at the time of travel.

“Nor did the committee find sufficient evidence to conclude that the commercial sex acts were induced by force, fraud, or coercion,” the report said.

However, someone identified as “Victim A” told the panel of twice having sex with Gaetz at a party in 2017 while she was underage, receiving a $400 cash payment that she understood to be for sex.

At the time, the victim had just completed her junior year of high school. She testified that she did not inform Gaetz that she was under 18 at the time, nor did he ask her age. The committee did not receive any evidence indicating that Gaetz was aware that she was a minor when he had sex with her.

Gaetz denied in a written submission to the panel that he had sex with anyone under the age of 18, but did not address the specific allegations related to “Victim A,” according to the report.

The move to make the report public was not unanimous.

Chairman Michael Guest said in a dissenting statement that the committee’s findings were not being challenged, but that the panel was deviating from “well-established standards” in releasing a report on a former member of the House.

“The Committee’s position regarding its lack of authority over former members represents a clear, well-established policy rather than an isolated interpretation,” Gaetz’s lawyers wrote in a complaint seeking to block the release of the report.

Gaetz lawyers said the report would contain “untruthful and defamatory information” about Gaetz.

A federal judge had not yet ruled on Gaetz’s request at the time the report was published.

Gaetz was the subject of a three-year FBI investigation into allegations of sex trafficking that produced no criminal charges.

Gaetz played a lead role in 2023 in forcing a first-ever successful vote by the House to oust its speaker, who at the time was Kevin McCarthy – just nine months into the job. – Reuters