'He looks unhinged': Kevin McCarthy suggests Matt Gaetz was on drugs at RNC

18 July 2024

Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) just fired shots across the bow at Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Florida), confirming that the feud between the two is showing no signs of abating anytime soon.

During an interview with CNN's Manu Raju, McCarthy was asked about a moment when Gaetz heckled him on the floor of the Republican National Convention (RNC) in front of multiple delegates. In that exchange, Gaetz told the former speaker that if he was speaking at the lectern, he would get "booed off the stage" by his fellow Republicans. McCarthy shrugged off the attack and turned the focus back to his rival.

"He looks very unhinged. A lot of people have concerns about him, and I'm not sure if he was on something," McCarthy said. "But I do hope that he gets the help that he needs. More importantly, I hope the young women get the justice they deserve when it comes to him."

When Raju asked McCarthy if he was referring to the ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation into the Florida Republican, he nodded and clarified that he was talking about the inquiry regarding "his partner who is in jail because they paid underage women for sex and drugs, yeah, that's what I'm referring to."

This isn't the first time the former House speaker has mentioned the lurid details of the allegations about Gaetz and his associate, former Seminole County tax collector Joel Greenberg. In 2022, Greenberg was sentenced to 11 years in federal prison as part of a plea agreement with the Department of Justice in its probe of Gaetz (the DOJ ultimately decided to not indict Gaetz in 2023). Earlier this year, McCarthy endorsed Gaetz's primary opponent (Navy veteran Aaron Dimmock) and called Gaetz "the Hunter Biden of the Republican Party."

Raju pressed McCarthy and asked him if he thought Gaetz was entitled to be presumed innocent until proven guilty.

"Well, people are in jail. The women have confirmed it," McCarthy said. He went on to say Gaetz asked him to use his ability as speaker to scuttle the Ethics Committee investigation, and only organized his successful campaign to strip McCarthy of the speaker's gavel when he declined to do so.

"That's what the whole motion to vacate was about," McCarthy continued. "He wanted me to engage and thought somehow I started this investigation. It started long before I was ever speaker. And as you know, in Congress, I don't get involved in ethics. It's an equal number [of Democrats and Republicans on the committee] and they could investigate me. It has to be its own arm and branch."

"There's no denying it," he added.

Watch Raju's interview with McCarthy below, or by clicking this link.

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