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 medication like cocaine and ecstasy, and obstructed Congress’s investigation into his conduct.
These conclusions are available in 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.
Gaetz has repeatedly denied having sexual contact with a minor and different wrongdoing. Final week, in anticipation of the report’s launch, Gaetz mentioned 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 informed The Hill on Monday forward of the report’s launch, in reference to the Division of Justice (DOJ) declining to file costs after investigating Gaetz for related issues.
Curiosity within the Ethics panel’s investigation reached its peak after President-elect Trump picked Gaetz to be lawyer normal, 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 identify from consideration for lawyer normal the next week.
His exit from the Home set off a debate about whether or not it was acceptable for the panel to take the uncommon, however not unprecedented, step of releasing its findings on a former member.
Home Ethics Committee Chair 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 provides considerably extra element and documentation about accusations which have swirled round Gaetz for years, together with testimony from the lady who was 17 years previous on the time of the alleged 2017 sexual encounter with Gaetz.
The report didn’t discover that Gaetz had engaged in intercourse trafficking, regardless that it mentioned Gaetz traveled with girls whom he paid for intercourse “on several occasions.”
Allegations of statutory rape
A girl recognized solely as Sufferer A informed the committee she had intercourse with Gaetz twice at a July 15, 2017, social gathering when she was 17 and Gaetz was a 35-year-old first-term congressman, although the committee mentioned it had no proof Gaetz was conscious of the lady’s age.
“Victim A recalled receiving $400 in cash from Representative Gaetz that evening, which she understood to be payment for sex. At the time, she had just completed her junior year of high school,” the report mentioned. “Victim A said that she did not inform Representative Gaetz that she was under 18 at the time, nor did he ask her age. The Committee did not receive any evidence indicating that Representative Gaetz was aware that Victim A was a minor when he had sex with her.”
Sufferer A mentioned she was underneath the affect of ecstasy throughout the encounter and recalled Gaetz utilizing cocaine at that social gathering, however she was “certain” about her encounter with Gaetz.
The report mentioned that whereas Gaetz denied partaking in sexual exercise with a minor, he “refused to answer specific questions relating to his interactions with Victim A.”
ABC Information reported that a part of the explanation the DOJ declined to file costs in opposition to Gaetz needed to do with issues {that a} jury wouldn’t convict him if prosecutors couldn’t display Gaetz knew the lady was 17.
However the Ethics report mentioned Gaetz’s data of the lady’s age doesn’t matter underneath Florida’s statutory rape legislation.
“Under Florida’s statutory rape law, it is a felony for a person 24 years of age or older to engage in sexual activity with a 16- or 17-year-old,” the report mentioned. “An individual charged with this offense could not declare ignorance or misrepresentation of the minor’s age as a protection.”
When information first broke about Gaetz being investigated by the DOJ over alleged sexual contact with the minor, Gaetz informed then-Fox Information host Tucker Carlson the 17-year-old “doesn’t exist.”
Allegations of drug use
The Ethics Committee’s report into Gaetz additionally detailed the previous congressman’s alleged use of medicine, together with marijuana, ecstasy and cocaine. Gaetz is a longtime supporter of hashish legalization, which was legalized for medical use in Florida in 2016 however remains to be unlawful for leisure use. He was a co-sponsor of laws in 2022 that pushed to legalize marijuana on the federal degree.
The panel mentioned it recognized not less than 20 cases between the start of 2017 and the center of 2020 with “substantial evidence” that Gaetz “met with women who were paid for sex and/or drugs,” and it mentioned it acquired testimony about “multiple additional events, trips, or parties” the place Gaetz “may have paid women for sex and drugs,” however the panel couldn’t decide the precise dates or areas for all of them.
One lady who spoke to the committee mentioned she witnessed Gaetz taking cocaine or ecstasy on not less than 5 events, and the panel mentioned “nearly every witness interviewed observed Representative Gaetz using marijuana.”
On some events, the committee alleged, Gaetz would ask girls he had intercourse with to deliver medication to their conferences, similar to “marijuana cartridges,” “vitamins” and “rolls.” Gaetz would generally repay the ladies instantly, the panel mentioned, noting he “sent one woman several hundred dollars for marijuana cartridges.”
Former Florida tax collector Joel Greenberg, who’s in jail for costs together with intercourse trafficking of a minor and fraud and had cooperated with the DOJ matter as a part of a plea settlement, informed the panel he sometimes would supply medication at occasions he attended with Gaetz, then the previous congressman “would pay him back in cash.”
The panel outlined proof regarding numerous journeys Gaetz took with girls that concerned the usage of medication.
In 2018, for instance, Gaetz traveled with two different males and 6 girls to the Bahamas, throughout which “several of the women recalled that Representative Gaetz appeared to be under the influence of drugs and that they took ecstasy during this trip,” in response to the report. One of many girls mentioned she noticed Gaetz taking ecstasy.
The panel additionally documented a January 2019 event when Gaetz paid two girls to journey with him to New York Metropolis to satisfy with him and his girlfriend on the time. The committee mentioned it reviewed textual content messages the place Gaetz “asked the women about obtaining drugs in advance of the trip.”
“[Who] can help [with] party favors?” Gaetz requested, in response to the panel.
The committee mentioned not less than one lady who spoke to the panel thought that the usage of medication at events and occasions they went to could have impaired their “‘ability to really know what was going on or fully consent.’”
“Indeed, nearly every woman that the Committee spoke with could not remember the details of at least one or more of the events they attended with Representative Gaetz and attributed that to drug or alcohol consumption,” the committee’s report reads.
Gaetz responded to allegations of drug use in an announcement he publicly posted in September responding to the committee, writing “I have not used drugs which are illegal, absent some law allowing use in a jurisdiction of the United States.”
Committee finds different violations and obstruction
The committee alleges Gaetz accepted improper items within the type of transportation and lodging associated to a 2018 journey to the Bahamas that included sexual encounters and drug use, in response to testimony given to the committee. Whereas Gaetz has denied that cost, the report mentioned Gaetz offered “no evidence showing how he paid for any travel costs other than his flight to the Bahamas, despite being given multiple opportunities to do so.”
In a discovering that claims Gaetz “dispensed special privileges and favors to individuals with whom he had a personal relationship,” the report says he “used the power of his office to assist a woman with whom he was engaged in a sexual relationship in obtaining an expedited passport,” regardless of that lady not being his constituent.
The committee additionally discovered that Gaetz obstructed the panel’s probe, noting he “declined to provide testimony voluntarily and did not appear when subpoenaed” and charging he “routinely ignored or significantly delayed producing relevant information requested by the Committee.”
Gaetz denies wrongdoing
Gaetz has vigorously denied having sexual contact with somebody youthful than 18 years and different wrongdoing, together with within the Monday courtroom submitting that aimed to dam the report’s launch. Gaetz’s attorneys mentioned the report accommodates “untruthful and defamatory information” that may “significantly damage” his fame.
The Division of Justice had appeared into whether or not Gaetz violated intercourse trafficking legal guidelines associated to the 17-year-old and touring together with her throughout state traces, however in 2023 the DOJ declined to cost Gaetz with a criminal offense.
When the DOJ probe ended, nevertheless, the Home Ethics Committee booted up its investigation into Gaetz. The committee is empowered by the Home to research whether or not representatives or employees have violated the foundations and requirements of the Home, and it has a lot completely different requirements from federal legislation enforcement businesses.
Gaetz has famous the completely different requirements of the inner Ethics Committee versus a courtroom when defending himself, saying in a publish 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.”
Report’s launch marks finish to drama on Capitol Hill
Monday’s launch of the report marks the top of a weeks-long drama surrounding whether or not the panel, which usually 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 Trump to be lawyer normal 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 finally withdrew his identify from consideration for lawyer normal days later amid opposition from GOP senators, then mentioned 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 gentle of his Cupboard nomination — and Democrats pushed for it even after he withdrew from consideration — whereas different Republicans contended the practically completed report ought to by no means be launched as a result of Gaetz now not was a member of Congress.
The Ethics Committee doesn’t have jurisdiction over former members of Congress. Whereas uncommon, nevertheless, the panel has just a few instances launched findings on former members — most lately 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 have been agency of their perception that the physique of labor ought to go public, Visitor, the panel’s chair, publicly mentioned the findings mustn’t see the sunshine of day. In November, after Gaetz withdrew his identify from consideration for lawyer normal, Visitor mentioned, “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 ultimate report, writing an uncommon dissenting assertion that criticized the panel’s choice to launch the report on Gaetz. He mentioned he was writing on behalf of panel members “who do not support the release of the report,” however he 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 mentioned.
Visitor’s assertion famous Gaetz has mentioned he is not going to 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 trouble to disclose the findings.
Up to date at 12:04 p.m. EST
