House Ethics report finds evidence Matt Gaetz paid thousands for sex and drugs including paying a 17-year-old for sex in 2017

The House Ethics Committee found evidence that former Rep. Matt Gaetz paid tens of thousands of dollars to women for sex or drugs on at least 20 occasions, including paying a 17-year-old girl for sex in 2017, according to a final draft of the panel’s report on the Florida Republican, obtained by CNN.

The House Ethics Committee found evidence that former Rep. Matt Gaetz paid tens of thousands of dollars to women for sex or drugs on at least 20 occasions, including paying a 17-year-old girl for sex in 2017, according to a final draft of the panel’s report on the Florida Republican, obtained by CNN. The committee concluded in its bombshell document that Gaetz violated Florida state laws, including the state’s statutory rape law, as the GOP-led panel chose to take the rare step of releasing a report about a former member who resigned from Congress. “The Committee determined there is substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz violated House Rules and other standards of conduct prohibiting prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, impermissible gifts, special favors or privileges, and obstruction of Congress,” panel investigators wrote. The panel investigated transactions Gaetz personally made, often using PayPal or Venmo, to more than a dozen women during his time in Congress, according to the report. Investigators also focused on a 2018 trip to the Bahamas – which they said “violated the House gift rule” – during which he “engaged in sexual activity” with multiple women, including one who described the trip itself as “the payment” for sex on the trip. On the same trip, he also took ecstasy, one woman on the trip told the committee. Earlier this month, the House Ethics Committee secretly voted to release its report after initially voting against doing so. The vote to put out the report – which was opposed by panel Chairman Michael Guest, a Mississippi Republican – was the culmination of a years-long probe into allegations surrounding Gaetz. He was President-elect Donald Trump’s first pick to be attorney general but dropped out amid opposition from GOP senators and after CNN reported key details of this same ethics report. And it’s a political jolt that could have reverberations for years to come, as the Capitol Hill panel takes aim at a long-time Trump loyalist and now conservative anchor at One America Network.