Witness Told Feds She Was Paid for Sex Parties With Matt Gaetz
When ABC News reported on Wednesday that the House Ethics Committee had acquired text messages between a young woman involved in the sex trafficking investigation and Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), a Gaetz spokesperson told ABC that the congressman “does not know anything about the woman you’re referencing.”
That seems extraordinarily unlikely.
The Daily Beast can now report that this woman told prosecutors in 2021 that she had sex with Gaetz at a drug-fueled party that she was paid to attend, according to the woman’s attorney.
This attorney told The Daily Beast on Thursday that the woman, in fact, received payments in connection with multiple sex parties with people in Gaetz’s circle. Her lawyer said that, in response to a subpoena, she testified about her experiences to the U.S. Attorneys investigating Gaetz. And she turned over text messages, photos, and other evidence to the Justice Department as part of its child sex trafficking inquiry into the Florida congressman, the lawyer said.
The Daily Beast has obtained some of those messages and photos, which match the documents described by ABC News.
While the lawyer said he has not yet been contacted by House investigators, as ABC reported, the House Ethics Committee is now reviewing this evidence as part of its inquiry into whether Gaetz paid for sex with women and with an underage teen. In fact, the Ethics Committee met Thursday afternoon behind closed doors to discuss the Gaetz case, which also involves allegations of public corruption, solicitation of prostitution, habitual use of hard drugs, bribes or impermissible gifts, campaign finance violations, and exhibiting nude photos of sexual partners on the House floor.
Is there a chance that the House will oust Goofy Gaetz, thus making the GQP majority negligible? Will they retain the creep, instead, perhaps with a useless censure?
... The woman, whose name The Daily Beast is withholding, was older than 21 at the time of the encounters, the attorney said, noting that she emphasized to prosecutors that the sex was consensual.
“She told them that she and lots of girls were provided all kinds of controlled substances at these parties,” the lawyer said, confirming a number of news reports about the gatherings....
Although the woman appears to have ultimately declined the trip to the Florida Keys, ABC reported that she posed for a selfie with Gaetz on May 19, the planned departure day. That photo, which The Daily Beast has obtained, was taken at 10:53 p.m. in Winter Garden, Florida, according to metadata on the photo. It shows the attention-grabbing conservative in a T-shirt emblazoned with a quote from former Planned Parenthood vice president Mary Lasker: “If you think research is expensive, try disease.”
Planned Parenthood?!
Pro-science?!
... At one point, the lawyer said, this person close to Gaetz berated his client for information about what she may tell anyone investigating Gaetz, and she felt that the clear intent was to pressure her to keep her mouth shut.
This Gaetz associate asked to meet the woman for lunch in the spring of 2021, the lawyer said. The setup made the attorney so uneasy, however, that he dispatched a colleague to tag along and monitor the meeting in secret.
“This associate was there asking her over and over and over what she had said, demanding she tell them,” the lawyer claimed. The lawyer reported that the woman felt intimidated but did not concede.
Last year, prosecutors announced they were declining to file charges against Gaetz, while also refusing to publicly offer an explanation. That decision, almost exactly one year ago, gave rise to frustration and outrage among key witnesses in the case, including women who had come forward to provide intimate and detailed accounts of their interactions, according to interviews with lawyers and witnesses in the matter.
Bribes? Extortion?
The Ethics probe appears to have rattled Gaetz. Last month, The Daily Beast reported that he privately told colleagues that the rebooted investigation was the reason he waged his scorched-earth campaign to oust then-House Speaker Kevin McCarthy. The months of infighting destroyed key allegiances within the House GOP, eroding trust and sowing enmity between members, feeding a stream of embarrassing headlines. Republicans still have not recovered from the damage.
Ah-ha!
... Gaetz’s close associate, Greenberg, struck a deal with prosecutors in May 2021, pleading guilty to child sex trafficking, fraud, and an array of other federal offenses. In his plea agreement, Greenberg admitted he had also connected the former 17-year-old to other unnamed “adult men” who had sex with her while she was still underage. After several proffers and deferments, Greenberg was eventually sentenced in December 2022, receiving 11 years in prison.
In a confession letter Greenberg penned in 2020 as part of his pursuit of a pardon from then-President Donald Trump, Greenberg wrote that Gaetz also paid to have sex with the 17-year-old, as The Daily Beast previously reported....
The Dem always gets 31-34% vs Goofy Gaetz.
