Potentially good news is closing the week regarding former Rep. Matt Gaetz’s next move.
The Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives is trying to put the brakes on a document that could harm Donald Trump’s pick for Attorney General.
“I’m going to strongly request that the Ethics Committee not issue the report because that is not the way we do things in the House,” Rep. Mike Johnson told POLITICO. “And I think that would be a terrible precedent to set.”
Ethics Chair Michael Guest isn’t saying yet whether a draft document will be shared with the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The Committee will examine the Panhandle Republican’s job qualifications and personal history.
U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said he “absolutely” wants full disclosure on the House probe, insisting “there should not be any limitations on the Senate Judiciary Committee’s investigation, including whatever the House Ethics Committee generates.”
The House Ethics Committee inquiry was still probing whether Gaetz engaged in sexual misconduct or illegal drug use and whether he granted special favors to romantic interests.
In June, Gaetz proclaimed his innocence in matters declared resolved.
“The House Ethics Committee has closed four probes into me, which emerged from lies intended solely to smear me,“ Gaetz posted on X. “Instead of working with me to ban Congressional stock trading, the Ethics Committee is now opening new frivolous investigations. They are doing this to avoid the obvious fact that every investigation into me ends the same way: my exoneration.”
The allegations go back to a widely reported sex scandal involving Gaetz that stemmed from a probe of crimes by former Seminole County Tax Collector and Gaetz associate Joel Greenberg.
The New York Times in March 2021 first reported on a Justice Department investigation into whether Gaetz had ever illegally sex-trafficked a minor across state lines. However, federal prosecutors in February of 2023 ultimately decided not to charge Gaetz with any crime.
–A.G. Gancarski, Florida Politics
