Matt Gaetz appears in a Jan. 6, 2022 file photo taken in Washington, D.C. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images).
Florida man Matt Gaetz was chosen by President-elect Donald Trump to serve as the next attorney general on Wednesday — prompting his immediate resignation from the U.S. House of Representatives.
Almost as soon as Gaetz hit the exit doors of the U.S. Capitol Complex, however, a whisper campaign about the four-term lawmaker began.
The abrupt departure was quickly and quietly linked to a long-running investigation by the House Ethics Committee.
Gaetz allegedly resigned just two days before the committee was slated to vote on releasing a “highly-damaging” report about him, according to anonymous sources cited by Punchbowl News.
Now, all indications are the formal report will never see the light of day — because the committee no longer has jurisdiction.
“What happens in ethics is confidential,” Ethics Chair Rep. Michael Guest, a Mississippi Republican, told Punchbowl News on Thursday. “We’re going to maintain that confidentiality.”
In early April 2021, the committee, then with the Democratic Party in the majority, announced an inquiry into Gaetz.
“The Committee is aware of public allegations that Representative Matt Gaetz may have engaged in sexual misconduct and/or illicit drug use, shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe, improper gratuity, or impermissible gift, in violation of House Rules, laws, or other standards of conduct,” Rep. Ted Deutch, a Florida Democrat, and Rep. Jackie Walorski, an Indiana Republican, said. “The Committee, pursuant to Committee Rule 18(a), has begun an investigation and will gather additional information regarding the allegations.”
That House investigation appeared to have been launched in direct response to media reports that the U.S. Department of Justice opened a sex-trafficking investigation into Gaetz during the final months of Trump’s first term — when the agency was operating under the control of 77th & 85th Attorney General Bill Barr.
The heart of the leaked inquiry was an allegation that Gaetz had engaged in sexual activity with a 17-year-old and paid for the teenager to travel with him, according to The New York Times’ original report citing anonymous “people briefed” on the DOJ’s probe.
Gaetz consistently denied the allegations and then leveled counter-allegations that he and his family were victims of an extortion plot.
“I have a suspicion that someone is trying to recategorize my generosity to ex-girlfriends as something more untoward,” Gaetz told the Times.
Addressing the allegations head-on, Gaetz also said he was “absolutely” confident none of his ex-girlfriends were under the age of majority — and reiterated that he spent money on them.
“I have definitely, in my single days, provided for women I’ve dated,” Gaetz told Axios. “You know, I’ve paid for flights, for hotel rooms. I’ve been, you know, generous as a partner. I think someone is trying to make that look criminal when it is not.”
Later, in an op-ed, Gaetz criticized the Biden administration for pursuing the investigation that began the year before.
Gaetz was quickly vindicated in the extortion plot claim.
By August 2021, Florida real estate Stephen Alford was indicted for a tangled and complex “scheme to defraud.”
As it turns out, in March 2021, Alford approached Gaetz’ father and demanded $25 million. That money would, in theory, be transferred to a law firm, and then transferred again, to be used to somehow secure the “Homecoming” of long-lost ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson, who was abducted in Iran in 2007 and who is widely presumed to be dead.
In exchange for the payoff, Alford — who reportedly referred to his scheme as “Project Homecoming” — dangled the prospect of a kibosh on the sex-trafficking inquiry — telling the then-congressman’s father his team had been “assured by the President” he would “strongly consider” a pardon or instruct the DOJ to back off the younger Gaetz.
In November 2021, Alford pleaded guilty to wire fraud. In August 2022, he was sentenced to 63 months in federal prison.
In September 2022, the DOJ’s investigation into Gaetz was shuttered.
In December 2022, a tertiary case within the orbit of Gaetz and high-powered Sunshine State politics came to a close with the sentencing of Florida tax collector Joel Greenberg, who once described himself as Gaetz’ “wingman” and pleaded guilty to a litany of federal charges, including sex trafficking a child. Greenberg had put off his sentencing for several months by reportedly offering to cooperate against other “public figures.” By the look of the sum, however, prosecutors were ultimately not interested in what the ex-tax assessor was selling.
The month prior, the Republican Party won control of the lower chamber, formally securing committee gavels from Democrats in January 2023. Meanwhile, the ethics investigation into Gaetz apparently continued into the 118th Congress — with Guest as chair.
In October 2023, Gaetz engineered the removal of Rep. Kevin McCarthy, a California Republican, from his role as speaker of the House.
The battle between Gaetz and McCarthy was, in one sense, a long time coming. Prior to McCarthy’s ascendance to the position, Gaetz was one of a handful of Freedom Caucus holdouts who refused to vote for McCarthy on numerous leadership ballots. And Gaetz never did give McCarthy his direct blessing — only finally, on the 15th ballot, voting “present” to shift the math ever so slightly in McCarthy’s favor.
Then, in a spirit of giveth and taketh away, came the Gaetz-led ouster. The Florida firebrand said McCarthy had to go due to a lack of budget cuts included in a government shutdown-averting agreement with Democrats.
McCarthy, however, had other ideas.
“I’ll give you the truth why I’m not speaker. It’s because one person, a member of Congress, wanted me to stop an ethics complaint because he slept with a 17-year-old,” McCarthy said during a panel discussion Georgetown University in April. “An ethics complaint that started before I ever became speaker. And that’s illegal and I’m not going to get in the middle. Did he do it or not? I don’t know.”
Now, in light of the surprising announcement by Trump, mixed messages are emanating out of Capitol Hill — but both the plaudits and the knives are coming from Gaetz’s own party.
“To every Republican, give Matt a chance,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who is likely to chair the Judiciary Committee, said on Fox News on Wednesday night.
On Thursday, Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican, seemed something not entirely unlike averse to Gaetz’ nomination.
“I think there should not be any limitation on the Senate Judiciary Committee’s investigation — including whatever the House Ethics Committee has generated,” the lawmaker from the Lone Star State said in response to a question from ABC News.
Pressed as to whether he personally wanted to review that likely to be nonpublic report, Coryn answered: “Absolutely.”
Other members of the GOP were more sanguine.
“Are you s—— me, that you just asked that question?” Rep. Mike Simpson, a Republican from Idaho, said in response to a question about whether Gaetz had the character and experience to serve as attorney general. “No! But hell, you’ll print that and now I’m going to be investigated.”
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