Profile
Sections
Local
tv
Featured
More From NBC
Follow NBC News
news Alerts
There are no new alerts at this time
The House Ethics Committee’s final report on its investigation into former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., found that he engaged in a long list of conduct that violates House Rules and some that are potentially criminal offenses at the state level.
The committee released <a href=”https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/matt-gaetz-report-full-document-house-ethics-committee-rcna184703
” target=”_blank”>its 42-page report Monday morning after a lengthy investigation.
“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 reads.
Gaetz has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and on Monday, in a series of posts on X, denied paying for sex. The committee in its report said he didn’t cooperate with its investigation and “routinely ignored or significantly delayed producing relevant information requested.”
Gaetz vacated his seat in November, days before the report was expected to be made public and after President-elect Donald Trump announced him as his pick for U.S. attorney general. Gaetz withdrew his bid after more details on the Ethics Committee investigation and other allegations were reported.
House Ethics Committee Chair Michael Guest, R-Miss., said Monday in a statement following the report’s release that while he does not “challenge the Committee’s findings,” he did not vote to release the Gaetz report.
“The decision to publish a report after his resignation breaks from the Committee’s long-standing practice and is a dangerous departure with potentially catastrophic consequences,” he said.
Trump’s transition team and House Speaker Mike Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
A Democratic member of the Ethics panel, Rep. Glenn Ivey of Maryland, said in an interview on MSNBC Monday that his committee’s purpose is “to make sure our members know what they can do, what they can’t do, what crosses the line and what doesn’t. And so I think issuing the report certainly provides guidance on that front.”
“We’ve got a lot of people who are concerned about Congress, cynical about Washington and the like,” he continued. “I think it’s important for us to be able to show that we are trying to keep our own House in order in this way.”
The committee outlined a significant amount of evidence that it says shows Gaetz, as a member of Congress, regularly engaged in sexual activity with women who he was also paying substantial sums of money. Committee investigators said they tracked more than $90,000 to 12 different women over a five-year period from 2017 to 2020. The Committee concluded the payments were likely connected to sexual activity and or drug use.
The committee said that while Gaetz has repeatedly denied ever paying for sex, when given the opportunity to put that claim in writing, “Gaetz refused to respond, asserting that ‘asking about [his] sexual history as a single man with adult women is a bridge too far.’”
The committee said that it heard testimony from more than half a dozen witnesses who attended parties, events and trips with Gaetz from 2017 to 2020 and “nearly every young woman that the Committee interviewed confirmed that she was paid for sex by, or on behalf of, Representative Gaetz.”
“While all the women that the Committee interviewed stated their sexual activity with Representative Gaetz was consensual, at least one woman felt that the use of drugs at the parties and events they attended may have ‘impair[ed their] ability to really know what was going on or fully consent,’” the report said. “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.”
Two women told the committee that Gaetz had paid them for sex, including a woman who said he paid a woman for sex at a small, invitation-only party in Florida, where prostitution is illegal, in 2017 while he was a member of the House, their lawyer told NBC News. Those women were of age at the time.
“My clients provided crucial testimony to the House Ethics Committee at significant personal cost,” attorney Joel Leppard, who represents the two women who testified to the House Ethics Committee, told NBC News in a statement, “The Committee’s thorough investigation and detailed findings vindicate their accounts and demonstrate their credibility. Their testimony, supported by extensive documentation and corroborating witnesses, has now been validated through this comprehensive investigation. We appreciate the Committee’s commitment to transparency in releasing this report so the truth can be known.”
The report also details a sexual encounter Gaetz was alleged to have had with a woman who was a junior in high school at the same party. The woman testified before the committee that she had sex with Gaetz twice at the 2017 party, when she was 17. She also claimed to receive money from the then-congressman that she perceived to be a payment for sex.
“The Committee received testimony that Victim A and Representative Gaetz had sex twice during the party, including at least once in the presence of other party attendees. 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 reads.
The woman “acknowledged that she was under the influence of ecstasy during her sexual encounters with Representative Gaetz at the July 15, 2017, party, and recalled seeing Representative Gaetz use cocaine at that party,” the committee said.
The woman told the committee that she did not tell Gaetz she was underage and the committee also said it did not discover any evidence that Gaetz knew he was having sex with a minor.
While the committee concluded that Gaetz may be in violation of several state laws, it said that it didn’t obtain “substantial evidence” that Gaetz violated federal sex trafficking laws. Gaetz was the subject of a lengthy criminal investigation by the Justice Department, but prosecutors chose not to bring charges.
The DOJ declined to provide a comment on the House Ethics report. Gaetz has claimed that he was exonerated by the DOJ, but declining to bring charges is not the same as exonerating an individual.
A senior Justice Department official told NBC News that the decision to not bring charges against Gaetz was made by career prosecutors and not Attorney General Merrick Garland or other DOJ leadership.
The official points out that bringing charges, prosecuting and proving the case in court is much different than a committee investigation. Addressing the federal sex trafficking allegations, the senior official says DOJ would have brought charges if they thought they had a winning case.
Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody’s office did not immediately return a request for comment. A spokesperson for Washington, D.C, Attorney General Brian Schwalb declined to provide comment.
The report goes into detail about a 2018 trip Gaetz took to the Bahamas with two men and six women. The committee said it believe the trip violated House gift rules, citing the testimony of one woman who described the trip as payment for sex. The committee said Gaetz engaged in sexual activity with several women on the trip and several women on the trip recalled Gaetz appeared to be under the influence of drugs and that they took ecstasy.
The committee said it found that Gaetz used cocaine, ecstasy and marijuana, and says there was “ample evidence” that Gaetz appeared “to have set up a pseudonymous e-mail account from his House office in the Capitol complex for the purpose of purchasing marijuana.”
The panel said he also used the power of his office to assist a woman he was engaged in a sexual relationship with to obtain an expedited passport with his chief of staff falsely claiming that she was his constituent.
Earlier Monday, in an attempt to prevent the report’s release, Gaetz sought a temporary restraining order against the committee and its chair, calling for an injunction that would prevent their release of the expected report detailing the investigation into him.
“The Committee’s apparent intention to release its report after explicitly acknowledging it lacks jurisdiction over former members, its failure to follow constitutional notions of due process, and failure to adhere to its own procedural rules and precedent represents an unprecedented overreach that threatens fundamental constitutional rights and established procedural protections,” Gaetz’s lawyers said.
Prior to the report’s release, Gaetz had repeatedly denied any wrongdoing, noting that a separate Justice Department probe into allegations of sex trafficking ended with no charges.
Gaetz has repeatedly denied having sex with anyone underaged or paying for sex.
“In my single days, I often sent funds to women I dated — even some I never dated but who asked. I dated several of these women for years,” Gaetz wrote on X last week lengthy post. “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. My 30’s were an era of working very hard — and playing hard too.”
“It’s embarrassing, though not criminal, that I probably partied, womanized, drank and smoked more than I should have earlier in life. I live a different life now,” Gaetz added.
Ryan Nobles is a correspondent covering Capitol Hill.
Gary Grumbach produces and reports for NBC News, based in Washington, D.C.
Rebecca Shabad is a politics reporter for NBC News based in Washington.
© 2024 NBCUniversal Media, LLC
