'P. Diddy of Florida politics': Gaetz condemned to political 'oblivion' after damning report

24 December 2024

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) resigned from Congress after President-elect Donald Trump nominated him to lead the Department of Justice. But now that his bid for attorney general has crashed and burned and his congressional career is due to end in January, Gaetz has quickly become a political pariah.

The Atlantic's Elaine Godfrey recently wrote that Gaetz will likely be unable to win any elected office for the foreseeable future in the aftermath of the House Committee on Ethics report that was published this week. The Florida Republican was presumed to be a candidate for the Florida governorship in 2026 after term-limited Republican Governor Ron DeSantis leaves office. However, political insiders in the Sunshine State believe that's no longer the case.

"He is farther from the governor’s mansion now than ever," former Gaetz consultant Peter Schorsch told the Atlantic. "GOP voters are not going to go with the P. Diddy of Florida politics."

The report details multiple instances of the former congressman allegedly paying multiple women for sex — including a 17 year-old girl dubbed "Victim A" who said she received a $400 Venmo payment from Gaetz. Victim A stated that she understood the payment was for sex, though added that she didn't disclose her age and Gaetz didn't inquire. Gaetz allegedly paid more than $90,000 to 12 different women between 2017 and 2020, according to the report. One former Florida Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives told the Atlantic that Gaetz's political career in the wake of the report was "oblivion."

Now that Gaetz is no longer likely to join the Trump administration's Cabinet, he's announced a show on the far-right One America News Network (OANN), after pro-Trump network Newsmax was reportedly apprehensive about hiring him due to the pending report. Gaetz is expected to relocate to San Diego, where OANN is headquartered, which Godfrey observed "might as well be Mars."

"This isn’t being MAGA or America first. This is being a disgrace," the former unnamed Republican lawmaker told the Atlantic.

In a series of tweets, the ex-lawmaker said that while he admitted that the details of the report were "embarrassing," he maintained they were "not criminal" and noted that Attorney General Merrick Garland's Department of Justice declined to formally file charges against him in 2023. He withdrew his name from consideration for the top spot at the Justice Department just eight days after Trump nominated him amid concerns from a decisive number of Republican senators.

Click here to read Godfrey's Atlantic article in its entirety (subscription required).

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