Photo: Alex Brandon/AP
The former representative of Florida’s first congressional district, Matt Gaetz (R-FL), resigned from his congressional seat on November 13th—the same day he was nominated by President-elect Donald Trump for Attorney General. Trump’s nomination of Gaetz stunned many people, from Republican lawmakers to their own constituencies. Considering Gaetz is effectively responsible for the ousting of Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House, his resignation from the House of Representatives resembled a large pest being exterminated.
Rep. Max Miller (R-OH) said that Gaetz “ran around here [Capitol Hill] last term like a six year old with a loaded revolver and a happy trigger finger.” Clearly by that assessment, Mr. Miller questions Gaetz’s intelligence and his attitude.
Matt Gaetz resigned from Congress on the same day that he became Trump’s nominee for AG. His resignation would be deemed illogical considering that nominees do not typically resign from their previous job until they are confirmed by the Senate. However, a House Republican who was granted anonymity while speaking to Politico called Gaetz’s resignation, “[an attempt to] stymie the ethics investigation.”
The ethics investigation that this anonymous House Republican mentions is an investigation, beginning in April 2021, of Matt Gaetz’s alleged involvement in the sex trafficking of a 17-year-old girl. While the allegations would be quite damning for anyone, especially an Attorney General nominee, the image is even worse with the abundance of evidence against him.
Despite the fact that there is not enough evidence to criminally convict Gaetz, there seems to be a general consensus around much of America and Congress that Gaetz is of dubious character. The Wall Street Journal reported that a list of Venmo and Paypal transactions show that between July 2017 and January 2019, Gaetz made payments of over $10,000 to two different women who testified before the House Ethics Committee.
The evidence against him—mostly payment logs and private message screenshots—while not enough to hold him criminally accountable, has placed a reasonable amount of guilt or suspicion on his shoulders. The House Ethics Committee finished the investigation of Gaetz and fearing the publication of the findings, Gaetz decided to resign from the House to prevent them from being released.
Because of his hasty resignation, he ran the risk of being out of a job if he lost the nomination to Attorney General. After failing to rally up enough support among Senate Republicans, he took himself out of the running for AG, leaving without a job.
While Matt Gaetz does not have an “official job with a salary” he does generate some cash flow on Cameo. For a price of 500$+ Matt Gaetz will make a personalized video just for you. His Cameo biography, which shows his fall from grace, reads as follows: “I served in Congress. Trump nominated me to be US Attorney General (that didn’t work out). Once I fired the House Speaker.”