Matt Gaetz Is Said to Face Justice Dept. Inquiry
Over Sex With an Underage Girl
An inquiry into the Florida congressman was opened in
the final months of the Trump administration, people briefed on it said.
Michael S. SchmidtKatie BennerNicholas Fandos
By Michael
S. Schmidt, Katie Benner and Nicholas Fandos
March 30,
2021
Representative
Matt Gaetz, Republican of Florida and a close ally of former President Donald
J. Trump, is being investigated by the Justice Department over whether he had a
sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid for her to travel with him,
according to three people briefed on the matter.
Investigators
are examining whether Mr. Gaetz violated federal sex trafficking laws, the
people said. A variety of federal statutes make it illegal to induce someone
under 18 to travel over state lines to engage in sex in exchange for money or
something of value. The Justice Department regularly prosecutes such cases, and
offenders often receive severe sentences.
It was not
clear how Mr. Gaetz met the girl, believed to be 17 at the time of encounters
about two years ago that investigators are scrutinizing, according to two of
the people.
The
investigation was opened in the final months of the Trump administration under
Attorney General William P. Barr, the two people said. Given Mr. Gaetz’s
national profile, senior Justice Department officials in Washington — including
some appointed by Mr. Trump — were notified of the investigation, the people
said.
The three
people said that the examination of Mr. Gaetz, 38, is part of a broader
investigation into a political ally of his, a local official in Florida named
Joel Greenberg, who was indicted last summer on an array of charges, including
sex trafficking of a child and financially supporting people in exchange for
sex, at least one of whom was an underage girl.
Mr.
Greenberg, who has since resigned his post as tax collector in Seminole County,
north of Orlando, visited the White House with Mr. Gaetz in 2019, according to
a photograph that Mr. Greenberg posted on Twitter.
No charges
have been brought against Mr. Gaetz, and the extent of his criminal exposure is
unclear.
Mr. Gaetz
said in an interview that his lawyers had been in touch with the Justice
Department and that they were told he was the subject, not the target, of an
investigation. “I only know that it has to do with women,” Mr. Gaetz said. “I
have a suspicion that someone is trying to recategorize my generosity to
ex-girlfriends as something more untoward.”
Mr. Gaetz
called the investigation part of an elaborate scheme involving “false sex
allegations” to extort him and his family for $25 million that began this
month. He said he and his father, Don Gaetz, had been cooperating with the
F.B.I. and “wearing a wire” after they were approached by people saying they
could make the investigation “go away.” Mr. Gaetz claimed the disclosure of the
sex trafficking inquiry was intended to thwart an investigation into the
extortion plot.
In a second
interview later Tuesday, the congressman said he had no plans to resign his
House seat and denied that he had romantic relationships with minors. “It is
verifiably false that I have traveled with a 17-year-old woman,” he said.
Representatives
for the Justice Department and the F.B.I. declined to comment, as did a
spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney’s office in Central Florida.
Mr.
Greenberg pleaded not guilty last year and was sent to jail this month for
violating the terms of his bail. He is scheduled to go on trial in June in
Orlando.
A frequent
presence on Fox News and other conservative media, Mr. Gaetz has recently mused
with confidants about quitting elected politics and taking a full-time job with
the conservative television channel Newsmax or another network, according to a
person familiar with the conversations. Axios first reported on Tuesday that
Mr. Gaetz was considering leaving Congress.
Mr.
Greenberg maintained ties to controversial figures who have supported Mr.
Trump, an examination of court records, social media posts and far-right
websites showed. A website run by a member of the far-right group the Proud
Boys and a network of fake social media accounts linked to Mr. Trump’s longtime
political adviser Roger J. Stone Jr. have promoted false accusations about Mr.
Greenberg’s rivals similar to rumors that prosecutors accused Mr. Greenberg of
secretly trying to spread.
It was not
clear how Mr. Greenberg knew either Mr. Gaetz or Mr. Stone. He posted a selfie
with both in 2017, tweeting, “Great catching up.” The following year, Mr. Gaetz
expressed support for Mr. Greenberg’s successful bid for local office,
predicting he would someday make a great member of Congress.
On Capitol
Hill, Mr. Gaetz has embraced the role of villain to the left as much as he has
served as one of Mr. Trump’s staunchest defenders and enablers, often with
theatrical flair. He wore a gas mask on the House floor last year in the early
days of the pandemic, insisting he was demonstrating concern for public safety
amid accusations he was mocking the seriousness of the spread of the
coronavirus.
Mr. Gaetz
was first elected to Congress in 2016. As a member of the Florida State
Legislature and the scion of a Republican political family, he had initially
backed former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida in the Republican presidential primary
that year before hitching his political fortunes to Mr. Trump.
It paid
off. He won a seat in Congress representing part of the Florida Panhandle, and
as one of Mr. Trump’s most flamboyant supporters on Capitol Hill and on cable
television, his profile skyrocketed.
Mr. Gaetz
invited a right-wing Holocaust denier to the State of the Union address in
2018, and attended an event last year where he said the Proud Boys had provided
security, though he has distanced himself from the group on his podcast. When
Democrats moved in 2019 to impeach Mr. Trump for the first time, Mr. Gaetz and
a phalanx of Republicans following him barged past Capitol Police into the
secure rooms of the House Intelligence Committee to briefly break up the
investigation into the president.
After Mr.
Trump’s defeat last year, Mr. Gaetz once again rallied to his side, defending
the president’s baseless claims of widespread election fraud. Mr. Gaetz helped
organize efforts among lawmakers to challenge President-elect Joseph R. Biden
Jr.’s victory during Congress’s certification of it on Jan. 6 that was
disrupted for hours by a pro-Trump mob that stormed the Capitol. Mr. Gaetz
later traveled to Wyoming to hold a rally against Representative Liz Cheney, a
Republican leader who had voted to impeach Mr. Trump for inciting the riot.
In 2017,
Mr. Gaetz was the only member of Congress to vote against a law that gave the
federal government more power and money to fight human trafficking.
“Voters in
Northwest Florida did not send me to Washington to go and create more federal
government,” Mr. Gaetz said in a local television interview at the time. “If
anything, we should be abolishing a lot of the agencies at the federal level.”
Mr. Gaetz’s
personal life has gained attention before. Last summer, he announced that he
had a son, Nestor Galban, 19, though Mr. Gaetz said he was not Mr. Galban’s
biological father, nor had he adopted him. Mr. Galban had been 12 when they met
and had come to the United States from Cuba; Mr. Gaetz was at the time dating
Mr. Galban’s sister.
“He is a
part of my family story,” Mr. Gaetz told People magazine in June. “My work with
Nestor, our family, no element of my public service could compare to the joy
that our family has brought me.”
Mr. Gaetz
is now engaged to an analyst named Ginger Luckey, 26, whom he proposed to at
Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club on Dec. 30.
It was
unclear how investigators in the Greenberg case began examining Mr. Gaetz’s conduct.
Last June, federal prosecutors secured an indictment against Mr. Greenberg,
accusing him of stalking a political rival.
Around that
time, federal authorities seized Mr. Greenberg’s phone and laptop, according to
court records. They discovered evidence that Mr. Greenberg, whose job
responsibilities included issuing licenses, was creating fake identification
cards for himself and a teenage girl, and was experimenting with holograms used
on permits for concealed firearms, according to court documents.
Two months
later, he was indicted on the sex trafficking charge. From May to November
2017, prosecutors said, Mr. Greenberg targeted the girl, who was between 14 and
17, saying he “recruited” and “solicited” her for sex acts in exchange for
unspecified perks or favors.
Mr.
Greenberg worked in advertising before running successfully at the age of 31 in
2016 for tax collector in Seminole County.
Within days
of taking office, he fired three employees who had supported his predecessor
and began spending more than $1.5 million in taxpayer money on personal
expenses, including guns, ammunition, body armor and a drone, as well as on
computers for his own cryptocurrency venture, a county audit later revealed.
The
following year, according to The Orlando Sentinel, Mr. Greenberg posted a
photograph of himself on social media with Milo Yiannopoulos, a right-wing
personality who has a history of making racist remarks. The newspaper also
detailed Mr. Greenberg’s own misogynist and anti-Muslim comments on Facebook.
In his bid
for re-election, Mr. Greenberg turned in late 2019 to clandestine tactics to
undermine a possible rival, according to court papers. Prosecutors said he sent
an anonymous letter to the school where one potential candidate worked that
made unfounded accusations of sexual misconduct with a student and making
similar claims on a fake Facebook account.
As the
primary race intensified last summer, similar messaging began appearing on fake
social media accounts that have been tied to Mr. Stone.
“Watch out
Seminole county,” said someone named April Goad on Facebook, warning Floridians
“don’t open your door” to the rival candidate, according to Graphika, a company
that specializes in analyzing social media.
The post
linked to an article about the rival published on Central Florida Post, a
website controlled by Mr. Stone’s associates that had written favorable
articles about Mr. Greenberg. The website was founded by a member of the Proud
Boys who has been linked to security providers for Mr. Stone on Jan. 6 in
Washington in the lead-up to the insurrection at the Capitol.
Mr.
Greenberg’s re-election efforts quickly evaporated when he was first indicted
last June, and he resigned a day later.
Kitty
Bennett and Susan C. Beachy contributed research.
Michael S.
Schmidt is a Washington correspondent covering national security and federal
investigations. He was part of two teams that won Pulitzer Prizes in 2018 — one
for reporting on workplace sexual harassment and the other for coverage of
President Trump and his campaign’s ties to Russia. @NYTMike
Katie
Benner covers the Justice Department. She was part of a team that won a
Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for public service for reporting on workplace sexual
harassment issues. @ktbenner
Nicholas
Fandos is congressional correspondent, based in Washington. He has covered
Capitol Hill since 2017, chronicling two Supreme Court confirmation fights, two
historic impeachments of Donald J. Trump, and countless bills in between. @npfandos
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