Matt Gaetz

Francis Chung/POLITICO by the use of AP Pictures

On Monday, the so much-anticipated House Ethics Committee File on former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) was once launched. The 37-page document titled “In the Matter of Allegations With regards to Representative Matt Gaetz” covers a stunning description of the “vast proof” that Gaetz “violated Home Rules, state and federal rules, and different standards of habits prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, acceptance of impermissible items, the provision of different favors and privileges, and obstruction of Congress.”

In November, Gaetz was once nominated by President-decide on Donald Trump to be the next attorney common and resigned from Congress ahead of losing his bid. The Florida firebrand’s alleged entanglement in a sprawling series of schemes and crimes — together with accusations about illegal drug use, bribes, and allegations he sexually trafficked a 17-12 months-previous woman — brought a number of noise to his nomination route, already rocky on account of the many bridges he burned together with his GOP congressional colleagues.

Gaetz’s former friend, former Seminole County Tax Collector Joel Greenberg, is currently in prison serving an 11-yr sentence after pleading guilty to paying a 17-12 months-outdated lady for intercourse while additionally providing her with unlawful drugs. In Greenberg’s plea, he admitted that he  “presented the minor to other adult males, who engaged in commercial sex acts,” even though the plea did not mention any explicit names of these adult males.

A Home Ethics Committee investigation was once opened into the allegations and rumors about the “highly destructive” contents of the committee’s document were swirling for months. Remaining week, news broke that the committee had taken a secret vote to liberate its report. As he has throughout, Gaetz denied all wrongdoing and has vowed to are trying to find to have sexual misconduct settlements and other harmful details about his former colleagues launched as payback, but finally there was once nothing he might legally do to dam the release of the report and it was once revealed with the aid of the committee Monday morning.

In the report, the committee mentioned that generally it might “in most cases” not unlock its findings after a Member resigns from Congress, thereby causing the committee to lose jurisdiction, however “there are a couple of prior circumstances where the Committee has determined that it was once in the public passion to unencumber its findings even after a Member’s resignation from Congress.”

“The Committee does now not accomplish that calmly,” the report endured. “On this instance, despite the fact that a number of Committee Members objected, a majority of the Contributors of the Committee agreed that the Committee’s findings should be released to the public.” To acquire that majority vote to unlock the report, some Republican individuals of the committee needed to pass celebration traces and vote in desire of release.

It must be referred to that the dissenting members’ remark certainly states “we don’t challenge the Committee’s findings,” and objects handiest to the decision to “unencumber a record on a person not under the Committee’s jurisdiction, an action the Committee has now not taken in view that 2006.”

The record goes on at length about Gaetz’s repeated efforts to “engage in obstructive conduct,” as he “constantly sought to deflect, deter, or deceive the Committee in order to stop his actions from being exposed”  — after which important points the evidence that they had been ready to gather despite his interference.

Below, the seven largest bombshells from the file.

7. Gaetz used congressional tools in connection to acquiring medicine and paying women for intercourse.

The “abundant evidence” incorporated in the report that Gaetz “bought and used marijuana” includes how “he appears to have set up a pseudonymous e mail account from his House place of job within the Capitol complex for the purpose of purchasing marijuana.”

The file also describes how Gaetz “arranged for his Chief of Team of workers to assist a woman with whom he engaged in sexual task in obtaining a passport, falsely indicating to the U.S. Division of State that she used to be a constituent.” This stood out to the committee as a result of typically district staff taken care of passport assistance requests and it was “odd” for the Chief of Staff to be concerned.

6. Gaetz “accepted gifts…in far more than permissible quantities,” specifically associated to a 2018 Bahamas go back and forth

Among the allegations focus on rowdy parties that featured heavy use of gear and alcohol, together with a specific 2018 go back and forth to the Bahamas. House Ideas restrict gifts valued over $250 bought through a non-public friendship with out formal approval from the committee, among other restrictions. There’s an exemption for “private hospitality,” which means receiving meals and lodging staying in any person’s for my part owned dwelling, however that doesn’t include air trip or stays in a rental property.

Gaetz went on a commute to the Bahamas in September 2018 that was once attended by two different men and 6 ladies. He “arrived by way of commercial aircraft later than the others, who arrived on personal planes,” the file states, and so they “stayed at a trip apartment booked and paid for by way of one of the male vacationers.” The travel concerned Gaetz “engag[ing] in sexual job with at least four of the ladies on the trip” and taking medicine, the record states. “The group back to Orlando on September sixteen, 2018; Consultant Gaetz flew on a private aircraft with another man and three women, while the remaining individuals flew on another personal plane.”

5. Gaetz “used or possessed unlawful drugs, together with cocaine and ecstasy, on multiple occasions.”

The record describes Gaetz sending textual content messages to the ladies asking them to deliver drugs to their encounters and sending them money. “Any other girl mentioned that she introduced cocaine to as a minimum one adventure with Representative Gaetz and that she witnessed him taking cocaine or ecstasy on as a minimum five occasions,” the file states, and Greenberg additionally “advised the Committee that he would in most cases present medicine, comparable to ecstasy, for occasions he attended and Consultant Gaetz would pay him again in money.”

“According to the evidentiary document, the Committee identified as a minimum 20 events from the beginning of 2017 throughout the center of 2020 the place there used to be enormous proof that Representative Gaetz met with women who had been paid for sex and/or drugs,” the file states, along with testimony about “multiple further situations, trips, or events” the place Gaetz “will have paid ladies for intercourse and medicine, despite the fact that the Committee may no longer determine the specific dates or locations for all of them.”

4. Gaetz “incessantly paid girls for enticing in sexual task with him” — totaling virtually $one hundred,000 paid to at the least 15 women

The forty two-yr-previous Gaetz has again and again tried to frame his prior habits all the way through his “single days” in his thirties as simply arduous partying — “It’s embarrassing, although no longer prison, that I more than likely partied, womanized, drank and smoked greater than I must have earlier in life,” he tweeted ultimate week — and being “beneficiant” with girls he “dated,” writing that he  “ceaselessly sent money to women I dated – even some I never dated but who requested.”

The record makes it clear that the figuring out between Gaetz and the ladies was once that the monetary funds were for having intercourse with him.

From 2017 to 2020, Consultant Gaetz made tens of lots of bucks in funds to women that the Committee decided were probably in reference to sexual job and/or drug use. Payments were made to these girls the use of peer-to-peer payment systems similar to PayPal, Venmo, and CashApp; while Consultant Gaetz had accounts in his name on each and every of these systems, he also occasionally paid ladies via some other person’s PayPal account, or through an account held underneath a pseudonymous electronic mail account. Consultant Gaetz also paid one of the women by test or in money.

One of the crucial payments incorporated in the document went to “Woman 1,” who was in a “lengthy-term relationship” with Gaetz “and subsequently some of the funds could have been of a valid nature,” but the Committee on the other hand concludes that “most” of the funds “have been for sexual job and/or drugs, or for her to go on to others for such purposes.” Girl 1 asserted her Fifth Modification rights when wondered about this.

“Many” of the ladies were “at the beginning contacted” by means of Greenberg by means of a web page referred to as “Looking for Arrangement” that “marketed itself as a ‘sugar relationship’ website that essentially related older males and youthful girls in the hunt for ‘jointly a good option relationships,’” the file states. “The website was typically understood via most of the women interviewed by way of the Committee to contain, at minimal, an trade of companionship for cash.”

Gaetz didn’t have his own account on SeekingArrangement.com, but the young ladies have been contacted through Greenberg’s account — and Gaetz had the login information. The two, who met at the home of Chris Dorworth, a lobbyist and former Florida legislator who resides in Seminole County, would steadily birthday party and go back and forth together and break up the prices of the alcohol, medication, and funds to the ladies:

Mr. Greenberg indicated he regularly confirmed the web page to Representative Gaetz and that he provided his login credentials to Representative Gaetz. In keeping with Mr. Greenberg, he and Representative Gaetz would break up the costs of “medicine, lodge[s], and ladies.” For instance, the Committee reviewed proof that such task came about in July 2017. Namely, proof showed that Consultant Gaetz, Mr. Greenberg, and others gathered at a condominium property positioned within the Brickell local of Miami, Florida for a weekend starting on July 7, 2017; Consultant Gaetz and Mr. Greenberg additionally hung out in Fort Lauderdale all through the Miami keep (throughout which era Representative Gaetz withdrew at the least $1,200 in cash from three completely different money owed at a single ATM). On June 22, 2017, Representative
Gaetz paid $6,308 for that condo booking. On July 9, 2017, Mr. Greenberg paid Consultant Gaetz $1,600 with the aid of check; Mr. Greenberg stated the take a look at was compensation for a share of the apartment. Mr. Greenberg additionally cited that they met up with some other person for dinner that weekend, and he shared a photo of Consultant Gaetz, himself, and the other particular person on social media on July 8, 2017.

The Committee acquired proof confirming that Consultant Gaetz from time to time in my opinion made payments to women who attended parties with him and Mr. Greenberg, the usage of various peer-to-peer electronic fee services and products, as well as assessments and cash. The Committee’s file also indicates that Mr. Greenberg once in a while paid women for having sex with Consultant Gaetz and was once sometimes reimbursed by using Consultant Gaetz. Witnesses indicated that there were instances the place a lump sum could be despatched to at least one girl, who would then distribute the money evenly among others who attended the parties. Likewise, in a single occasion Consultant Gaetz sent $400 to Mr. Greenberg with the word “Hit up [Victim A]”; Mr. Greenberg then despatched two ladies funds totaling $400, including Victim A.

“Sufferer A” — the 17-yr-old — “recalled receiving $four hundred in cash from Representative Gaetz that night, which she understood to be payment for intercourse,” the record states.

Any other anecdote within the file describes “proof that [Gaetz] understood and shared a few of the ladies’s transactional views of their preparations:

In one textual content change considered via the Committee, Consultant Gaetz balked at a girl’s request that he ship her cash after he accused her of “ditching” him on a night when she was feeling tired, claiming she only gave him a “drive via.” The woman asserted to Consultant Gaetz that she used to be being “treated otherwise” than different ladies he was once deciding to buy intercourse. The Committee additionally acquired textual content messages wherein Representative Gaetz’s then-girlfriend informed one of the crucial women who were most often paid for sex that “the guys [Representative Gaetz and Mr. Greenberg] wished me to share that they’re a bit of restricted in their cash go with the flow this weekend . . . [M]att was like[,] if it may be extra of a customer appreciation week. . . .”A few months later, she referred to that, “Btw Matt also talked about he’s going to be slightly generous cause of the ‘purchaser appreciation’ factor ultimate time.” Any other woman particularly recalled a dialog with Representative Gaetz about considerations with Mr. Greenberg’s “following via” with expected payments after Mr. Greenberg’s encounters along with her.

Mr. Greenberg informed the Committee that Representative Gaetz used to be aware that the women that they had sex
with and paid had met Mr. Greenberg throughout the “sugar courting” site. Representative Gaetz did not appear to have negotiated specific payment amounts previous to attractive in sexual process with the ladies he paid. Instead, the women had a normal expectation that they would in most cases receive some amount of money after every sexual stumble upon.

The report contains important points about Greenberg’s communications with the ladies, together with a textual content message exchange by which $four hundred “per meet” is negotiated and Greenberg sends along a photograph of the “good friend” who shall be becoming a member of them: Gaetz.

Screenshot from House Ethics Report

Screenshot from Home Ethics File

The committee flatly rejects Gaetz’s claim he was once simply being “beneficiant” to girls he dated. “Representative Gaetz took benefit of the economic vulnerability of younger girls to trap them into sexual activity for which they acquired an ordinary of some hundred dollars after each and every encounter,” the report states. “Such habits isn’t ‘generosity to ex-girlfriends,’ and it does not replicate creditably upon the Home.”

3. “Virtually every lady” who spoke to the committee had been so drunk or high they couldn’t fully keep in mind that the details of occasions they attended with Gaetz. At the least one girl testified the heavy drug and alcohol use “impaired” her ability to fully consent and that she felt “violated.”

From the file:

Whereas all the girls that the Committee interviewed said their sexual task with Representative Gaetz was once consensual, at least one lady felt that the use of medicine at the parties and events they attended will have “impair[ed their] skill to in reality recognize what used to be happening or totally consent.” Indeed, nearly each lady that the Committee spoke with might not understand that the main points of at the least one or more of the events they attended with Representative Gaetz and attributed that to drug or alcohol consumption. The women additionally mentioned instances where Representative Gaetz would attempt to persuade them to have sex with him or Mr. Greenberg: “[H]e would make me really feel unhealthy about no longer having sex with him or [] Joel Greenberg” and that he would say, “Why don’t you need to have intercourse with me” or “[Mr. Greenberg] seems very unhappy over there .. .. Make him chuffed.”Any other woman stated that their relationship one day was once a “loving friendship,” but over time got here to feel like a “job.” A 3rd woman said, “[After I appear again on sure moments, I believe violated.” One woman mentioned, “I take into accounts it at all times …. I still see him once I activate the tv and there’s nothing any individual can do. It’s irritating to grasp I lived a fact that he denies.”

2. Gaetz “engaged in sexual activity with a 17-12 months-previous lady” — and the testimony from the victim and different corroborating witnesses is “credible”

Florida statutes impose what’s legally known as “strict scrutiny” prohibiting someone 24 years of age or older from having intercourse with a 16- or 17-12 months old. It does not subject that the lady did not affirmatively tell Gaetz her age or even though she had misrepresented her age; the legislation imposes 100% of the burden on the adult having intercourse with any individual who might be a minor.

“Representative Gaetz’s movements have been in violation of Florida’s statutory rape legislation,” the report pronounces. The now-adult lady described as “Victim A” was 17 years outdated and had simply completed her junior year of highschool when she attended a party at Dorworth’s residence on July 15, 2017. The Dorworth place of abode is in a gated neighborhood with security that requires visitors to show their driver’s license to enter and data are maintained of these visitors.

Victim A informed the committee she was “underneath the influence of ecstasy all the way through her sexual encounters” with Gaetz at this celebration, that she and Gaetz “had sex twice right through the celebration, including as a minimum once within the presence of other party attendees,” and she or he “recalled receiving $400 in money from Consultant Gaetz that evening, which she understood to be payment for sex.”

“There is giant evidence that Consultant Gaetz engaged in sexual task with a 17-yr-old woman,” the report states. “The Committee obtained credible testimony from Sufferer A herself, as well as more than one people corroborating the allegation. Several of those witnesses have additionally testified under oath prior to a federal grand jury and in a civil litigation. Consultant Gaetz denied the allegation however refused to testify beneath oath. He has publicly stated that Victim A ‘doesn’t exist’ and that he has not ‘had intercourse with a 17-12 months-old for the reason that I was once 17.’ The Committee found that to be untrue and decided that there is great proof that Consultant Gaetz had intercourse with Victim A in July 2017, when she was 17 years previous, and he was 35…The Committee found no purpose to doubt the credibility of Sufferer A.”

1. The DOJ did not pursue justice regardless of overwhelming evidence and impeded the committee’s investigation

Perhaps most damning is the committee’s conclusion that the Division of Justice used to be an impediment to the investigation and failed the reason for justice by now not charging Gaetz with any crimes. The report is unequivocally vital of the DOJ for failing to pursue prices towards Gaetz in gentle of the entire testimony and different evidence, and particularly speaks to the chilling effect the lack of motion from DOJ had on the victims and witnesses:

Lots of the girls with whom the Committee spoke also gave statements to DOJ and urged the Committee to rely on
these statements in lieu of requiring them to relive their experience. They had been particularly involved in offering additional testimony a few sitting congressman in mild of DOJ’s lack of motion on their prior testimony. DOJ refused to offer the related statements and other important evidence to the Committee. DOJ noted interior insurance policies about defending uncharged topics like Consultant Gaetz, basic considerations about how DOJ’s cooperation with the Committee may deter different victims in other matters, and quite a lot of inapposite insurance policies in the case of congressional oversight of DOJ itself. DOJ’s initial deferral request and subsequent lack of cooperation with the Committee’s assessment caused significant delays in the investigation; those delays were compounded by means of Consultant Gaetz’s obstructive efforts. The Committee has decided that its findings need to be released without further impediments.

The record discusses one of the women concerned who “mentioned a terror of retaliation from the congressman when declining to talk on the report with the Committee,” and sought to research the allegations that Gaetz “will have sought to tamper with witness testimony in connection with its investigation or the DOJ’s investigation,” but was once as soon as once more stymied by the DOJ when the company “refused to provide a copy of an audio recording in which Representative Gaetz discussed the DOJ’s inquiry with some of the women he paid for intercourse.”

Sufferer A used to be particularly disappointed by way of the DOJ’s failure to act; the record describes how she “cooperated with DOJ’s investigation for years and was once let down by means of the justice device when experiences circulated that DOJ would be unlikely to pursue fees in opposition to Consultant Gaetz.”

The DOJ additionally refused to respond to FOIA requests and subpoenas despatched by means of the committee:

After three months with out a response despite repeated practice up, the Committee submitted FOIA requests to a number of relevant DOJ offices, which up to now have not been accurately processed. The Committee continued to succeed in out to DOJ all through 2023, having still now not obtained a substantive response to its request for data. On January 12, 2024, the Committee acquired its first correspondence from DOJ on the matter. At the moment, DOJ supplied no substantive response or reason for its delay; as an alternative, DOJ simply said that it “do[es] now not provide personal information about regulation enforcement investigations that
do not result in charges.” This “coverage” is, on the other hand, inconsistent with DOJ’s historical habits with appreciate to the Committee and its distinctive position in upholding the integrity of the Home.

Thereafter, the Committee determined to difficulty a subpoena to DOJ to obtain data in terms of its investigation of Consultant Gaetz. DOJ did not conform to the subpoena by the date required, but prompt it remained “committed to excellent-religion engagement with the Committee.” In the spirit of cooperation, the Committee equipped a listing of particular responsive documents, surroundings out particularized calls for to the subpoena. Among the particularized demands was a request for any exculpatory evidence in relation to Representative Gaetz. On March thirteen, 2024, Committee Participants met with the Assistant Legal professional General for the Office of Legislative Affairs and the Foremost Deputy Assistant Attorney Basic for the Prison Division of DOJ. The DOJ officials once more noted no prison basis for failing to agree to the subpoena. DOJ due to this fact requested further context for the Committee’s demands, which the Committee supplied. After additional makes an attempt at meaningful lodging of DOJ’s considerations in regards to the breadth of the Committee’s request, DOJ in some way provided publicly stated details about the testimony of a deceased particular person. Thus far, DOJ has supplied no meaningful evidence or knowledge to the Committee or stated any lawful foundation for its responses. The Committee hopes to continue to have interaction with DOJ on the broader issues raised by its failure to acknowledge the Committee’s unique mandate. As the Committee has instructed DOJ, the Committee and DOJ should be partners in their shared mission of upholding the integrity of our government institutions.

The Committee initially made a narrowly tailor-made request for data to Consultant Gaetz searching for information limited to the allegations that might no longer be inside DOJ’s jurisdiction—the alleged acceptance of an flawed present and sharing of nude images and videos on the Home ground.

Learn the full House Ethics Committee file here.

The put up 7 Largest Bombshells in Matt Gaetz House Ethics Record: ‘Enormous Proof’ of Crimes, Including Statutory Rape first regarded on Mediaite.