4 highlights from the scathing Gaetz Ethics report

The scathing House Ethics Committee report released Monday caps off one of the most extensive investigations into former Rep. Matt Gaetz’s (R-Fla.) conduct, headlined by findings that Gaetz paid a 17-year-old high school student for sex and used illicit drugs like cocaine and ecstasy.

The report accuses Gaetz of misusing his office to dispense a personal favor, pushes back on those disputing the facts surrounding the 2017 party where Gaetz allegedly had a sexual encounter with the 17-year-old, reveals text messages between Gaetz and multiple women that made references to drugs, and documented failed attempts to get new information from the Justice Department.

Gaetz has vigorously denied wrongdoing.

“These claims would be destroyed in court — which is why they were never made in any court against me,” Gaetz told The Hill on Monday ahead of the report’s release.

Here are some highlights from the report:

New accusation of using office to dispense personal favor

The report said Gaetz in 2018 arranged for his chief of staff to help a woman with whom he was engaged in sexual activity obtain a passport, falsely representing to the State Department that she was a constituent.

While many of the allegations that are extensively detailed in the committee findings have been reported on for years, the allegation about Gaetz improperly using his office to obtain a passport for the woman is new.

According to the report, after Gaetz had met the woman through his former friend Joel Greenberg and had sex with her, the woman — who did not know at the time that Gaetz was a congressman — said she needed a new passport for an upcoming trip. Gaetz then connected the woman with his chief of staff, who worked with the State Department to help secure a passport for the women in a process meant for constituents. The woman, however, did not live in Gaetz’s congressional district.

The report noted that the chief of staff was no longer employed in Gaetz’s office as it investigated the matter and did not respond to the committee.

Committee finds ‘Victim A’ more credible than Gaetz ally

The report found substantial reason to believe that Gaetz had a sexual encounter with a 17-year-old, identified as Victim A, at a July 15, 2017, party when the congressman was 35. 

But Gaetz has maintained that the encounter never happened and has used another witness who disputes parts of the testimony as a means of discrediting the core finding.

The alleged encounter took place at the home of Chris Dorworth, a former Florida state representative. That is according to testimony from Victim A, testimony from two other women, and the sworn response of Greenberg, who is currently in prison for sex trafficking of a minor and fraud charges and who cooperated with the DOJ matter as part of a plea agreement. Victim A said she was “certain” about the encounter with Gaetz that night.

While Victim A testified that Dorworth was present for the party, Dorworth testified to the committee that he was not present — and used that assertion to accuse Victim A of lying about Gaetz as well.

Dorworth separately sued Greenberg and several other people in federal court for defamation in relation to the allegations, saying online that he was told Victim A planned to sue him for millions of dollars. He settled with Victim A in an agreement in which no funds were exchanged, according to the report. He dropped a separate case against Greenberg.

Gaetz on Monday shared a thread on social platform X by Dorworth that again asserted he was not at the party, using it as a means of discrediting the entire report.

“This is why they didn’t ever present these allegations in a forum where they could be challenged,” Gaetz said.

But the committee clearly did not think Dorworth’s assertions outweighed those of the alleged victim, explaining that Dorworth could not explain cell phone data that poked holes in his testimony.

“After the Committee’s interview, and after he settled his lawsuit against Victim A, Mr. Dorworth was deposed and confronted with cell phone records showing that he was in fact at his residence during the party. Mr. Dorworth stated, ‘I don’t have an answer to these questions,’” the report said.

While the committee did not share Victim A’s full testimony, it included part of it in a footnote: “I wasn’t that drunk at the beginning of the party, and those two memories are so huge in my head,” she said. Asked if there was any chance she misremembered whether or not she had sex with Gaetz when she was 17, Victim A said: “No.” 

Victim A also told the committee that while Greenberg claimed to have seen her have sex with Gaetz at the home of another individual when she was 17, she did not recall that instance, and had “hazy memories” of other occasions she saw Gaetz.

Text message screenshots show Gaetz asking women to bring ‘party favors’

The Ethics Committee released screenshots of text message exchanges between Gaetz and two women he paid to travel with him to New York City in January 2019.

Gaetz instructed the women to book flights on Spirit Airlines and Delta Air Lines — with one of the women asking, “So fly into Newark and out of New York??”

Later in the exchange, Gaetz asked: “Who can help [with] party favors?” That was an inquiry about obtaining drugs in advance of the trip, according to the committee.

The committee also said it “received evidence that Representative Gaetz sent the women money to compensate them for sexual activities they engaged in with him during the trip,” citing an interview with one of the women.

Department of Justice did not cooperate

The Ethics Committee report noted multiple times that the Department of Justice, which reportedly investigated Gaetz for sex trafficking in relation to the 17-year-old but declined to charge Gaetz with a crime, did not fully cooperate with the panel’s requests for information.

The Ethics panel had sought statements that women with whom Gaetz was allegedly involved gave to the DOJ, saying that many of the women did not want to provide more testimony and “relive their experience” and were concerned about additional testimony in light of the DOJ’s lack of action.

“DOJ cited internal policies about protecting uncharged subjects like Representative Gaetz, general concerns about how DOJ’s cooperation with the Committee may deter other victims in other matters, and various inapposite policies relating to congressional oversight of DOJ itself,” the report said.

The committee said it submitted Freedom of Information Act requests to relevant DOJ offices but those “have not been adequately processed.” 

It also issued a subpoena to the Department of Justice, which, despite some back-and-forth exchanges, did not fully comply.

“DOJ ultimately provided publicly reported information about the testimony of a deceased individual. To date, DOJ has provided no meaningful evidence or information to the Committee or cited any lawful basis for its responses,” the Ethics report said.

The committee also said it looked into whether Gaetz tried to tamper with witness testimony in connection with the DOJ investigation.

“DOJ refused to provide a copy of an audio recording in which Representative Gaetz discussed the DOJ’s inquiry with one of the women he paid for sex,” the report said.