Yesterday morning, two rapists boarded a plane.
Yesterday afternoon, the first rapist nominated the second rapist to be America's next Attorney General.
Yesterday evening, the second rapist resigned from Congress and, just like that, the House Ethics Committee's plan to release a "highly damaging report" on him was zapped.
As the Committee itself wrote in June 2024, its investigation was exploring accusations that:
Gaetz may have engaged in sexual misconduct and/or illicit drug use, shared inappropriate images or videos on the House floor, misused state identification records, converted campaign funds to personal use, and/or accepted a bribe, improper gratuity, or impermissible gift, in violation of House Rules, laws, or other standards of conduct.
The Ethics Committee's investigation began in 2021 and resumed in 2023 after the DOJ declined to prosecute Gaetz, much to the amazement of Gaetz's partner-in-sex-crimes Joel Greenberg, as well as Greenberg's lawyer, Fritz Scheller.
Greenberg himself was sentenced to 11 years after cooperating with authorities and pleading guilty to "underage sex trafficking, wire fraud, stalking, identity theft, producing a fake ID card, and conspiring to defraud the US government."
Alabama's nincompoop Senator Tommy Tuberville suggested that anyone who got in the way of the Gaetz nomination—anyone who failed Trump's most extreme MAGA purity test yet—would be targeted for removal from the Senate.
But more serious GOP Senators spoke out at the nomination's lack of seriousness and noted that Gaetz's confirmation would (normally) require a comprehensive FBI background check and a very public (and very messy) Senate hearing.
What's really going on?
The most obvious answer is Trump is simply giving Gaetz the cover to resign in order to quash the Ethics Committee's investigation, preventing the damning report from ever seeing the light of day. (As long as Trump remembers to turn the screws on MAGA Mike Johnson to make sure the Ethics Committee doesn't decide to go rogue and release it anyway.)
Equally likely, both men believe the widely hated-within-his-own-party Gaetz will be forced to withdraw from consideration before he gets anywhere near the DOJ.
But the charade offers an easy way to make a martyr of Matt Gaetz among the MAGA faithful, preserving his viability either as a Trump-loving TV loudmouth or for some yet-to-be-announced future role.
And assuming Gaetz does flame out, Trump knows that any Republicans who deny him one nominee will find it harder to reject the next name on his list of extreme and unqualified Cabinet picks.
It's also worth noting that Gaetz's own primary rival in his 2022 re-election campaign highlighted Gaetz's hiring of a former Jeffrey Epstein attorney to fight the sex trafficking investigation, even suggesting that Gaetz might have dirt on Trump himself.
Clearly, the two rapists had a meeting of the minds on Trump Force One on Wednesday morning.
Even if the second rapist never becomes the first rapist's Attorney General, the two men remain unpunished for their past crimes.
They will no doubt be collaborating on future projects, unburdened by what has been.
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P.S. This really is the time to get off X once and for all. Please find me on Bluesky and these other places.
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