- Columnist Bill Crawford says the Mississippi Congressman and House Ethics Committee chairman has remained mum on the controversy and investigation surrounding Trump’s AG nominee.
President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Matt Gaetz for U.S. Attorney General puts Mississippi Congressman Michael Guest on the spot.
Last week, Gaetz suddenly resigned from Congress just days before the House Ethics Committee was due to vote to issue an investigative report on Gaetz. Guest chairs the Ethics Committee.
In May of 2023, the committee reinstated a review paused in 2021 pending a DOJ review of sex trafficking charges. In June the committee explained its review would focus on whether Gaetz engaged in sexual misconduct and illicit drug use, accepted improper gifts and sought to obstruct government investigations of his conduct.
Per House custom, Gaetz’s resignation ended the Ethics Committee investigation and, possibly, its report.
Pressure is building for the committee to release it.
“Senators have an important decision to make, and I think they should have all the information necessary to make the right decisions,” Republican Rep. Dan Newhouse told The Hill.
Republican Sen. John Cornyn, a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that will consider Gaetz’s nomination, told reporters that he “absolutely” wanted to see the committee’s findings.
It would take at least one Republican vote on the 11 member committee to release the report, assuming all five Democratic members voted for release.
The steadfast Guest could be that vote.
In a statement, Sen. Dick Durbin, current chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, calling on the House to preserve and share its findings, said, “The sequence and timing of Mr. Gaetz’s resignation from the House raises serious questions about the contents of the House Ethics Committee report. We cannot allow this valuable information from a bipartisan investigation to be hidden from the American people.”
If Guest’s committee doesn’t act, Cornyn said the Senate should subpoena the report.
Either scenario puts Guest on the spot to act.
Still and all, Republican criticism of Trump’s choice could derail the nomination before the Senate gets around to any hearing next year.
It was “an unexpected pick that took many, including fellow House Republicans, by surprise,” reported Fox News.
Calling it a “reckless pick”, Republican Rep. Max Miller, a Trump admirer, told CNN, Gaetz is “a guy who is literally worse than the gum on the bottom of my shoe.”
GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska told the Associated Press, “as far as I am concerned,” Gaetz is not a serious candidate.
Guest remained mum on the controversy. “With the confidentiality that surrounds the committee,” Guest told The Hill, “I can’t give you any information of significance.”
“The simpleton is crowned with folly; the wise man is crowned with knowledge” – Proverbs 14:17.
Bill Crawford
