'There were witnesses': Attorney for minor urges release of Gaetz ethics report

Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida in 2020 (Gage Skidmore)
David Badash
November 14, 2024News & Politics

An attorney representing a woman who claims Matt Gaetz had sex with her when she was 17 is urging the House Ethics Committee to release its report on the former Florida Republican lawmaker who just became President Donald Trump’s nominee for Attorney General.

Gaetz, who suddenly resigned Wednesday, immediately after Trump announced his intention to nominate him to become the nation’s top law enforcement officer, had been under investigation for years by the House Ethics Committee for allegations that he “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.”

The sexual misconduct claim is widely believed to be the allegation of sex with a minor, which the U.S. Dept. of Justice had been investigating, but no charges were ever filed. DOJ reportedly also had been investigating Gaetz for the possibility of sex trafficking of underaged girls, according to The Associated Press.

“Among those who have given testimony to the House Ethics Committee is a woman who says she had sex with Gaetz at a 2017 party shortly after he was elected to Congress. The woman was 17 at the time,” CBS News reports.

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Attorney John Clune, who represents that woman, wrote: “Mr. Gaetz’s likely nomination as Attorney General is a perverse development in a truly dark series of events. We would support the House Ethics Committee immediately releasing their report. She was a high school student and there were witnesses.”

The Ethics Committee was scheduled to vote Friday on whether to release its completed report, as Punchbowl News first reported.

“Multiple sources [in June] told CBS News that four women had informed the House Ethics Committee that they had been paid to go to parties that included sex and drugs, and that Gaetz had also attended. The committee has Gaetz’s Venmo transactions that allegedly show payments for the women,” CBS adds.

The Ethics Committee’s practice generally is to close any investigations once the subject of an investigation is no longer a member of Congress.

However, this is not always the case.

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“There is precedent in Congress on the Senate side for an ethics committee report to become public after a member resigns from Congress, however. In 2011, this happened when Sen. John Ensign of Nevada resigned amid allegations that he tried to hide an extramarital affair,” CBS noted.

There is a bipartisan call on the Senate side to see the Gaetz report.

“Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, called on the House Ethics panel to preserve and share the report, as well as ‘all relevant documentation’ on Gaetz with his committee.”

“The sequence and timing of Mr. Gaetz’s resignation from the House raises serious questions about the contents of the House Ethics Committee report,” Durbin said in a statement Thursday. “We cannot allow this valuable information from a bipartisan investigation to be hidden from the American people. Make no mistake: this information could be relevant to the question of Mr. Gaetz’s confirmation as the next attorney general of the United States and our constitutional responsibility of advice and consent.”

U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) “told reporters Thursday morning he ‘absolutely’ wants to see the House Ethics Committee’s report on Gaetz.”

“I think there should not be any limitation on the Senate Judiciary Committee’s investigation, including whatever the House Ethics Committee has generated,” Cornyn said.

Last year, ABC News reported, “Gaetz’s former close friend Joel Greenberg, who sources said agreed to cooperate in the federal probe into Gaetz, was sentenced to 11 years in prison after pleading guilty to crimes including sex trafficking of a minor and introducing her to other ‘adult men’ who also had sex with her when she was underage. Greenberg agreed to provide ‘substantial assistance’ to prosecutors as part of their ongoing investigation.”