Pelosi’s ‘House Ethics Committee’ Caught in Multiple Staggering Lies in Gaetz Report

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz is just that — a former representative.

That made the release of an investigation by the House Ethics Committee into his professional and private life — begun during former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s 117th Congress — highly unusual. The interest of the House Ethics Committee is generally into the ethics of sitting members.

Moreover, the position that Gaetz resigned to pursue — attorney general of the United States — is one he’s no longer pursuing due to the fact that some of the contents of that report had already been revealed long ago and he didn’t have the votes to get confirmed by the Senate, report or no report.

Gaetz has now moved into the land of cable news punditry, with a new show on One America News television network. If he’s likely to pursue any sort of career in politics in the future, it seems unlikely he’d re-transition into the world of elected or confirmed public officialdom. As the old “Simpsons” meme goes, “Stop! Stop! He’s already dead!“

That being said, it’s worth examining the Gaetz ethics report — something the media is loath to do, inasmuch as they’ve reported on the findings as if the former Florida representative’s resignation and attorney general recusal is a prima facie admission that everything in it is true.

The report’s major takeaways were that “there is evidence that Representative Gaetz paid women to travel to New York and Washington, D.C. for commercial sex” and that there was also “substantial evidence that Representative Gaetz used cocaine, ecstasy, and marijuana.”

To a certain extent, Gaetz has never claimed he’s been a choirboy all his life. “Let me first remind everyone that I am a representative in Congress, not a monk, and certainly not a criminal,” he said in an Op-Ed for the Washington Examiner in 2021, after the first spate of reports regarding his private life began coming out.

“My personal life is and always has been conducted on my own time and my own dime. Consensual adult relationships are not illegal. Although I’m sure some partisan crooks in Merrick Garland’s Justice Department want to pervert the truth and the law to go after me, I will not be intimidated or extorted,” Gaetz wrote.

“My lifestyle of yesteryear may be different from how I live now, but it was not and is not illegal. I defended [California Democrat] Rep. Katie Hill’s ‘throuple’ when her own Democratic colleagues wouldn’t,” he added. “I just didn’t think it was anyone’s business.”

The Op-Ed did not, it’s worth noting, address the drug allegations — something that was also part of Rep. Katie Hill’s downfall.

Nevertheless, when someone is responding to allegations of frequent sexual escapades that may or may not be illegal and use of drugs that definitely are and part of their defense — in fact, the very first paragraph of their defense — includes the statement that they are “not a monk,” it’s safe to say they’ve done something their parents wouldn’t want them to do.

Thus, I come neither to bury Gaetz nor to praise him, but simply remark on the believability of the report — because both the document and its release set an important precedent about how the Democrats and/or swampy Republicans plan to fight Donald Trump and his allies during a second Trump term.

One of the few people who’s been following this story — and not taking everything in the report at face value — is Mollie Hemingway of The Federalist, who’s noted several issues with the report.

The latest? At least one of the people mentioned in the report, a friend of Gaetz’s, has demanded corrections from the House Ethics Committee for mentions of him in the report which he says are erroneous.

The letter was first reported by Marc Caputo of NeverTrump outlet The Bulwark, but Hemingway noted how it dovetailed with numerous other issues with the report.

“At the outset, I’ll note the release of your committee’s report is bizarre, Congressman Gaetz is no longer subject to your jurisdiction, and the precedential effect of the release of this report cannot be overstated,” a lawyer for Chris Dorworth, the man mentioned, wrote in a letter to House Ethics Committee chair Rep. Michael Guest, a Mississippi Republican.

The letter went on to list “three demonstrably false statements within your report” regarding Dorworth.

The first involved a mention that “Mr. Dorworth believed that Representative Gaetz invited people to his home on the evening of July 15, 2017.” This evening was critical, inasmuch as the most problematic allegation in the report — that Gaetz paid to have sex with a minor — happened on that night at Dorworth’s home.

“No, Mr. Dorworth did not and has never believed that Representative Gaetz invited people to his house on July 15, 2017,” the letter stated.

“To support your claim that Gaetz ‘invited’ people to my client’s home, you cite, in footnote 97, a gate log that doesn’t include Gaetz’s name on it and reference an affidavit and deposition transcripts that say nothing about Gaetz inviting anyone to my client’s home.” [Emphasis theirs.]

Furthermore, the letter stated, “Mr. Dorworth’s deposition transcript does not support this statement in your report, and it should be retracted immediately.”

Again, this basically undermines the most serious allegation completely, inasmuch as the Ethics Committee’s report relies upon Dorworth’s memories of that evening and the fact that he lived in a complex where “non-residents are required to present a driver’s license before entering, and entry records are maintained.”

If those entry records don’t have Gaetz’s name on them, they were either 1) tampered with, or 2) the preponderance of the evidence regarding the allegation shifts radically.

The second discrepancy also involves that allegation, noting that “Mr. Dorworth was deposed and confronted with cell phone records showing that he was in fact at his residence during the party.”

“As an attendee at Mr. Dorworth’s deposition, I can assure you he was never ‘confronted with any cell phone records,” adding that the records “were deemed ‘Attorneys Eyes Only’ at the time of Mr. Dorworth’s deposition” and that he was “mortified that the Committee on Ethics would include such a ridiculous conclusion” in its report.

The third alleged discrepancy, later in the same paragraph: “The Committee requested, through counsel, that Mr. Dorworth clarify his testimony regarding his whereabouts on the evening of July 15, 2017; his counsel did not respond.”

His counsel, being the author of this letter, noted that he did, saying he ed the staff on Sept. 6 of this year.

“Interesting. The House ‘Ethics’ Committee is caught here just flat out lying about three things in its report on Matt Gaetz. (In addition to all the other alleged falsehoods),” Hemingway noted in an X repost of the letter:

Interesting. The House “Ethics” Committee is caught here just flat out lying about three things in its report on Matt Gaetz. (In addition to all the other alleged falsehoods) https://t.co/OwYyBRZS8F

— Mollie (@MZHemingway) December 24, 2024

Again, it’s difficult to overstate how damning serious mistakes in this part of the report would be, particularly given the decision to release it absent any real reason to do so; without substantial evidence that Gaetz paid to have sex with a minor, what you have is essentially a log of someone’s alleged substance use disorder and/or dysfunctional sex life the better part of a decade ago.

And again, this isn’t the only issue with the report. As Hemingway noted in a November article, “the same two central witnesses the House Ethics Committee has relied on for its critical report of Gaetz” are the two witnesses whose credibility issues led the Department of Justice to drop its investigation of Gaetz in 2022.

One is a former tax assessor who agreed to plead guilty to charges that included “sex trafficking of a child, aggravated identity theft and wire fraud,” according to The Washington Post, in exchange for “substantial assistance” in building cases against other people.

He’s currently in prison for those charges. The other is the woman who was allegedly the minor Gaetz paid for sex; the Post said her “testimony has issues that veteran prosecutors feel would not pass muster with a jury.”

Let me reiterate: Joe Biden’s Department of Justice thought this case wouldn’t fly based on the believability of the witnesses central to the House Ethics Committee’s report. If the Biden DOJ wouldn’t go ahead with the public crucifixion of a Trump ally, it generally has to be really bad.

This is the House “Ethics” Committee. How could it get any worse? I suppose we could have Democrat Rep. Barney Frank hiring a male prostitute as an aide — a prostitute who then proceeded to run a male escort service out of Frank’s home — and the Ethics Committee, then in Democrat hands, more or less absolving him of serious guilt.

Why not re-investigate him? Sure, Barney’s been out of Congress for nearly 12 years now — but once we’ve broken precedent, let’s go all the way. And heck, the witnesses against him don’t even need to be credible. They surely weren’t here.

And that’s the problem with the release of the Gaetz report as scandal warfare by Democrats and RINOs against Trump and his allies. Sure, it seems satisfying at the moment, but remember the Golden Rule of Politics: Do unto others as they do unto you.

If this is how the House Air-Quotes “Ethics” Committee is going to work from here on in, I’d be more worried about being a member of the Katie Hill/”throuple” or Barney Frank/escort service party. And why stop at the lower chamber? I don’t think Juanita Broaddrick, say, would mind giving testimony about former President Bill Clinton.

The possibilities are endless — because the thing about Pandora’s Box is that opening it once is all you need.

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