Washington – The House Ethics Committee is scheduled to meet Wednesday as pressure grows to release a potentially damaging report detailing its investigation into the allegations against a former Florida representative. matt getz Two sources told CBS News that he engaged in sexual misconduct and illegal drug use.
The ethics panel's activities have come under intense scrutiny since President-elect Donald Trump's announcement last week. Gaetz was selected To act as Attorney General. The Florida Republican resigned his seat in the House in the wake of the announcement, removing the Ethics Committee's jurisdiction over Gaetz because he is now a former member.
The ethics committee declined to comment on the upcoming meeting. the panel was we were supposed to meet on friday to vote on releasing the report, but Trump chose Gaetz to be the nation's top law enforcement official just days earlier. After this the committee adjourned its meeting.
Gaetz must win Senate confirmation to serve as attorney general, and senators are calling to see the Ethics Committee report as they consider whether to approve his nomination. Any confirmation hearing, which would be conducted by the Senate Judiciary Committee, would not take place until next year after Trump's inauguration. Republicans will regain control of the upper chamber in the next Congress, which begins on January 3.
Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas told reporters last week that he believed senators should have access to the Ethics Committee's findings.
Cornyn, who sits on the Judiciary Committee, said, “I think there should be no limits on the Senate Judiciary Committee's investigation, including what the House Ethics Committee has generated.”
Trump ally, GOP Senator Markway Mullin of Oklahoma, similarly told NBC's “Meet the Press” on Sunday that he believes the Senate should be able to see the report on Gaetz.
“Congress has to advise and consent, and Matt Gaetz has to go through the same scrutiny as every other person, and I'm going to give him a fair chance like every other person, and at the end of the day, the Senate has to confirm him.” Will happen,” he said.
But House Speaker Mike Johnson has warned against release The Ethics Committee report warned in an interview Sunday that doing so for someone who is not a current House member would be “Pandora's Box.”
Johnson said on CNN's “State of the Union” program, “What I have said with respect to the report is that it should not come out. And why? Because Matt Gaetz has resigned from Congress. He is now a member of the Are not.” “There is a very important protocol and tradition and rule that we maintain that the House Ethics Committee's jurisdiction does not extend to non-members of Congress.”
The House Ethics Committee first began investigating allegations of misconduct against Gaetz in April 2021, but postponed consideration of it in response to a request from the Justice Department. It resumed its investigation in May 2023 after federal investigators refused to charge Gaetz is pursuing their sex-trafficking and obstruction investigation.
Gaetz has denied any wrongdoing and has blamed the ethics investigation on former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. He has called the investigation a “discredit”. Florida congressman helped lead Historic effort to oust McCarthy Speaker's gavel last year.
ethics panel said in june It spoke to more than a dozen witnesses, issued 25 subpoenas and reviewed thousands of pages of documents as part of its investigation into Gaetz, and determined that “some of the allegations require continued review.”
The committee said it was investigating allegations that Gaetz engaged in sexual misconduct and illegal drug abuse, accepted inappropriate gifts, gave “special privileges and benefits” to people close to him, and tried to obstruct government investigations of his conduct. Is.
Multiple sources told CBS News at the time that four women told the Ethics Committee that they were paid to go to parties Gaetz attended that involved sex and drugs. The panel has Venmo transactions from Florida Republicans that allegedly show payments to women. A woman testifying before the Ethics Committee said she had sex with Gaetz at a party shortly after he was elected to Congress in 2017 and when she was 17, sources told CBS News at the time .
His lawyer, John Clune, said on social media It was reported last week that she was a high school student and “there were witnesses.”
“We will support the House Ethics Committee immediately releasing its report,” Clune wrote.
