US representative Matt Gaetz (R-FL) attends the second day of the 2024 Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on July 16, 2024.
Patrick T. Fallon | AFP | Getty Images
A woman told the House Ethics Committee that she saw Matt Gaetz, who is President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for the U.S. attorney general, have sex with a minor, her lawyer said Friday.
“My client testified to the House Ethics Committee that she witnessed Rep. Gaetz having sex with a minor at a house party in Orlando in 2017,” Joel Leppard said.
Gaetz, a far-right Republican U.S. representative, resigned from Congress on Wednesday after Trump announced plans to nominate him for attorney general, has denied all allegations of sexual misconduct.
Leppard said the woman he represents testified before the House Ethics Committee in April.
He said he represents two witnesses who have provided testimony to the committee regarding Gaetz.
“The American people deserve to know the truth about the person slated to become the top law enforcement officer in the country” Leppard told NBC News.
ABC News was the first to report that Leppard had said his client had testified before the panel.
“Merrick Garland’s DOJ cleared Matt Gaetz and didn’t charge him. Are you alleging Garland is part of a cover-up?” a spokesperson for Gaetz said Friday.
Gaetz, 42, who represented Florida’s District 1 covering part of the Florida Panhandle, was investigated by the FBI on sex-trafficking allegations involving a 17-year-old and was not charged with any crime.
The federal investigation ended last year. Gaetz has said he was the target of an extortion plot.
A House Ethics Committee investigation was launched in April 2021. It was deferred at the request of the Department of Justice and reauthorized in 2023 after the department withdrew that deferral request.
What happens with the committee’s report now that Gaetz has resigned from Congress remains unclear.
Some Republican senators say they want details from the committee’s investigation before a confirmation vote.
On Friday, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson said he plans to request that the ethics panel does not release its report, saying that because Gaetz is no longer in Congress doing so would be a “terrible breach of protocol.”
The Senate is supposed to vote on whether Gaetz is confirmed as attorney general, although a recess appointment could be possible. Trump has called for the Republican Senate majority to allow him to make recess appointments.
The House Ethics Committee, which is bipartisan and made up of 10 members, was supposed to meet Friday to discuss the report on Gaetz and whether to release it to the public, but that was called off on Thursday, a source said.
Gaetz practiced law at a Florida law firm before being elected as a state representative. He was first elected to Congress in the 2016 election and began his first term in early 2017. He was re-elected in November.
