Matt Gaetz has been at the center of a big controversy.
No one is sure what to believe about him.
But this information that just came out could change everything.
When Donald Trump nominated Matt Gaetz for Attorney General, it led to a huge outburst of controversy and many Republicans felt they could not in good conscience vote for him.
Ultimately these Republican defectors led to Gaetz stepping down from the nomination.
Trump then put up former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi as his replacement.
But Gaetz is not out of the news – or woods – just yet.
There’s been an investigation into some of Gaetz personal activities while in office and now a draft of the final report has been leaked to the public.
If the things found in the report are true, Gaetz won’t have much of a political future any time soon.
According to The Guardian, “A leaked draft of a House ethics committee report on Matt Gaetz, the former Florida Republican congressman, found ‘substantial evidence’ that he engaged in sex trafficking and paid for sex with a minor, among other serious violations of state law and congressional rules.”
The key here is what evidence was actually found considering that just a few years ago the Justice Department dropped their case against Gaetz based on a lack of evidence.
“The draft investigation was obtained by CNN and concludes that Gaetz, Trump’s first pick for attorney general, made payments totaling tens of thousands of dollars to women for sex and drugs across at least 20 separate occasions. The draft report also states that in 2017 Gaetz paid a 17-year-old girl for sex, which would constitute statutory rape under Florida law,” The Guardian reports.
“According to the final draft document reported by CNN, Gaetz used payment apps including Venmo and PayPal to transfer money directly to more than a dozen women during his time in Congress.”
“The report comes after a more than three-year investigation and represents a volte-face following an earlier committee vote not to issue the results of an inquiry it began in the spring of 2021, when Gaetz was the subject of an FBI investigation.”
It’s clear that, at a minimum, Gaetz was engaged in things that no member of Congress – or really anyone – should be engaging in.
Whether he broke the law, however, is something that’s not definitively proven yet and the House will have to make their case clearly.
In the meantime, Gaetz maintains his innocence.