File: Florida representative Matt Gaetz, left, reportedly pushed to remove former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, right, to quash allegations that the Florida Rep ‘slept with a 17-year-old’
Pressure is rising in the US Senate for details on the House’s sexual misconduct probe into Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump’s controversial pick for attorney general, as even some members of the president-elect’s own party view the nomination warily.
Lawmakers were stunned Wednesday when Trump tapped Gaetz, a polarizing and embattled House lawmaker, to be the nation’s top law enforcement officer. Several Republican senators have expressed concerns, and Trump can only afford to lose four GOP votes on any nominee.
“We should gain access to all relevant information by whatever means necessary,” Texas Republican Senator John Cornyn said on Wednesday.
Cornyn, who has previously sparred with Trump, suggested that the Senate needs to review the House ethics report during the confirmation process.
“There’s various ways we can gain access to it,” Cornyn told reporters. “We can subpoena it.”
Gaetz, a Florida Republican who resigned his seat after Trump’s announcement on Wednesday, has been the subject of a long-running ethics investigation, the results of which reportedly were set for release on Friday. Gaetz, 42, has denied wrongdoing.
House Ethics Committee members are scheduled to meet Friday, a person familiar said.
Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota said he and his fellow Republicans will insist on seeing the report, even if it is only viewed privately and not released for the public. He signaled that the timing of Gaetz’s resignation makes the report all the more important in his confirmation.
Senate Democrats plan to use their last weeks in the majority to try to make public a House sexual misconduct probe into Matt Gaetz, President-elect Donald Trump’s controversial pick for attorney general.
“I am calling on the House Ethics Committee to preserve and share their report and all relevant documentation on Mr. Gaetz with the Senate Judiciary Committee,” Chairman Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, said in a statement Thursday.
Tom Rust, chief counsel and staff director of the House ethics panel, declined to comment Thursday on the status of the investigation or the panel’s response to Durbin’s request.
Durbin cannot individually compel the report’s release and it was not immediately clear if he could use his chairmanship to subpoena it. That would likely require a majority vote on his committee.
The House, however, could ignore the subpoena.
Speaker Mike Johnson said late Wednesday Gaetz submitted a resignation letter but Gaetz’s office hasn’t returned requests for comment on the matter.
The Ethics Committee said in June that its members were continuing to look into allegations that he engaged in sexual misconduct, took illicit drugs and accepted improper gifts. Gaetz said in September that he was no longer voluntarily cooperating with the probe.
Trump’s decision to nominate Gaetz as the nation’s chief law enforcement officer surprised and baffled lawmakers in both parties. It will test Trump’s sway over Senate Republicans, who will take control of the chamber in January and must confirm the president-elect’s nominees.
The GOP is expected to hold a 53-47 seat majority, so it would take just four Republican senators to block his confirmation, unless he could attract Democratic votes. Multiple Republican senators signaled their skepticism of the choice, laying bare the confirmation challenge ahead.
Gaetz, a lightning rod within his own caucus, has been plagued by scandals, including an investigation by the Justice Department that he had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl in exchange for money. He denied the allegations and was notified last year that he wouldn’t face charges.
When asked Wednesday by reporters about the choice, Cornyn said: “I’m trying to absorb all this.” Another Republican senator, Susan Collins of Maine, said the pick was completely unexpected, adding that an FBI background check is part of any confirmation process. Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican, said she doesn’t believe Gaetz is a serious candidate for the post.
“We cannot allow this valuable information from a bipartisan investigation to be hidden from the American people,” Durbin said. “Make no mistake: this information could be relevant to the question of Mr. Gaetz’s confirmation as the next Attorney General of the United States and our constitutional responsibility of advice and consent.”
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