Dec.24

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

Yep, Gaetz Is a Sleazeball

The House Ethics Committee on Matt Gaetz has finally been released. It is here, if you would like to read it. If you do so, you really should be 18 years of age or older (i.e., too old to date Matt Gaetz).

Pretty much every outlet had a list of "takeaways" from the document. Here is one of those:

1. Gaetz used congressional resources in connection to obtaining drugs and paying women for sex.
   
   
2. Gaetz "accepted gifts... in excess of permissible amounts," specifically related to a 2018 Bahamas trip.
   
   
3. Gaetz "used or possessed illegal drugs, including cocaine and ecstasy, on multiple occasions."
   
   
4. Gaetz "regularly paid women for engaging in sexual activity with him"—totaling nearly $100,000 paid to at least 15 women
   
   
5. "Nearly every woman" who spoke to the committee had been so drunk or high they couldn't fully remember the details of events they attended with Gaetz. At least one woman testified the heavy drug and alcohol use "impaired" her ability to fully consent and that she felt "violated."
   
   
6. Gaetz "engaged in sexual activity with a 17-year-old girl"—and the testimony from the victim and other corroborating witnesses is "credible"
   
   
7. The DOJ failed to pursue justice despite overwhelming evidence and impeded the committee's investigation.

Gaetz filed a last-minute lawsuit trying to get a judge to order the report be withheld. Obviously, that was not successful. Gaetz is threatening to rescind his resignation, and to be sworn in, just to put himself in a position to force the promulgation of embarrassing information about other members of the House. It's not clear whether he'll actually try it and, if he does, if it would be legal. There's a pretty strong argument that once Gaetz notified Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) of his resignation, it became binding, especially once a special election was called.

Gaetz also unspooled a long, and somewhat unhinged, series of tweets yesterday in which he said that the Committee deliberately conspired to release the report the same week as Christmas, and that "evidence" would "exonerate" him. He did not provide any of this evidence, however. It must be hiding in the same place as the evidence that was going to exonerate Bill O'Reilly.

We presume that between this, and the fact that he was probably unelectable anyhow, it will put an end to Gaetz' gubernatorial aspirations. That said, we're not certain. He's shameless, and today's Republican Party has a lot more tolerance for sleazy acts than was the case in generations past. Maybe he'll throw his oversized hat into the ring nonetheless, and maybe Florida voters will adopt a "boys will be boys" attitude, not unlike what happened with "grab 'em by the pu**y."

Incidentally, there is now a pretty good explanation for what changed from "we're not releasing the report" to "we're releasing the report." Or, more precisely, there's a pretty good explanation for WHO changed. Reportedly, there were two Republican members of the Committee who flipped and joined with the five Democrats: Dave Joyce (R-OH) and Andrew Garbarino (R-NY). Since Chair Michael Guest (R-MS) added a one-page objection to the document, we know it certainly wasn't HIM who flipped. Nobody seems to know why Joyce and Garbarino changed their minds, but the fact that Gaetz is a colossal jerk with the morals of a televangelist may be a part of it. (Z)