Quote:The House overwhelmingly passed a bipartisan bill to support human trafficking victims on Tuesday, with a strong vote of 401-20 backed by both Democratic and Republican Representatives.
Among the 20 Republicans who voted against re-authorizing the Frederick Douglass Trafficking Victims Prevention & Protection Reauthorization Act of 2022—legislation that supports programs preventing human trafficking and supporting its victims—was Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, who's currently under federal investigation for the alleged sex trafficking of a 17-year-old girl.
While all House's Democrats but one who abstained and 183 Republicans voted in favor of the bill, these 20 Republicans voted against it:
Brian Babin of Texas
Andy Biggs of Arizona
Lauren Boebert of Colorado
Mo Brooks of Alabama
Ken Buck of Colorado
Andrew Clyde of Georgia
Matt Gaetz of Florida
Louis Gohmert of Texas
Paul Gosar of Arizona
Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia
Andy Harris of Maryland
Jody Hice of Georgia
Thomas Massie of Kentucky
Thomas M. McClintock of California
Mary Miller of Illinois
Troy Nehls of Texas
Ralph Norman of South Carolina
Scott Perry of Pennsylvania
Chip Roy of Texas
Van Taylor of Texas
NEWSWEEK NEWSLETTER SIGN-UP >
Matt Gaetz
Matt Gaetz is pictured at a news conference on January 06, 2022 in Washington, D.C. Gaetz was among the 20 Republicans who voted against the re-authorization of a human trafficking bill on Tuesday.
ANNA MONEYMAKER/GETTY IMAGES
That Gaetz appears in this list is not surprising, considering he had previously made headlines as the only Representative to vote "no" on a human trafficking bill in December 2017, which established an advisory committee coordinating efforts to prevent human trafficking.
The Florida congressman had then said that he had voted against the bill to avoid the creation of new federal entities, calling the legislation "mission creep" and an "expansion of the federal government."
But when in 2021 the New York Times revealed that Gaetz was being investigated by the Justice Department for the alleged sex trafficking of a 17-year-old girl—allegations he denies—many suddenly saw a connection between his 2017 lone vote and the probe against him.
According to the New York Times, the federal investigation into the Florida congressman was opened in the final months of the Donald Trump's administration, following a previous investigation into Gaetz's political ally and friend Joel Greenberg, who has since pleaded guilty to sex trafficking.
Investigators are trying to determine whether Gaetz paid an underage girl, then 17, for sex and paid for her to travel across state line with him—which would constitute sex trafficking under federal law.
Not much is known of the investigations, but a few details have been leaked by the media.
The Washington Post reported that Gaetz used to set up dates with women in exchange for dinner or hotel stays—which would be illegal only if there was a clear exchange of money for sex—and that Greenberg himself wrote a letter directly accusing Gaetz of paying for sex with women.
The Daily Beast reported that Gaetz transferred money to the equivalent of $900 to Greenberg on Venmo, saying "hit up ___," using a nickname for the 17-year-old.
The Florida congressman has always denied the accusations, saying that "no part of the allegations against me are true." Newsweek has contacted Gaetz for comment.
After Gaetz once more opposed a bill on human trafficking, rumors are again spreading on social media that the Florida congressman might be voting out of personal interest.
"I'll give you one guess as to how Matt Gaetz voted on this. And you'll be correct," political commentator Brian Tyler Cohen wrote on Twitter.
On Monday night, Mike Pence's former chief of staff Marc Short told CNN he'd be "surprised" if Gaetz will still be voting in 2024.
"It's more likely he'll be in prison for child trafficking by 2024," he said, answering a question about his potential concerns over the Florida congressman if Pence were to run for president at the next election.
"So, I'm not too worried what Matt Gaetz thinks," Short said.
He voted against this and a warning system for active shooters because it would "be blowing up your phone all day." Ah well, vote for the GOP and you get this AND cuts to mental health care availability!
I remember watching Al Franken (who I quite like) thoroughly dismantle claims against John Kerry voting against military funding.
He thoroughly dismantled the claims by pointing out how much pork, or add-ons, were added to the bill that caused the no vote. Since that time I have never taken "X voted no against X" at face value. Was there a specific reason? Was there an add-on that caused the no vote? I know asking such questions is painful for pure partisan hacks, but these are questions I'd liked asked, and answered, before I condemn someone for their vote. Note, I'm not a fan of Gaetz, despite the spin some will try and put on this post, but I do ask for clarity before I start gnashing my teeth and pulling my hair.
(07-28-2022, 12:05 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I remember watching Al Franken (who I quite like) thoroughly dismantle claims against John Kerry voting against military funding.
He thoroughly dismantled the claims by pointing out how much pork, or add-ons, were added to the bill that caused the no vote. Since that time I have never taken "X voted no against X" at face value. Was there a specific reason? Was there an add-on that caused the no vote? I know asking such questions is painful for pure partisan hacks, but these are questions I'd liked asked, and answered, before I condemn someone for their vote. Note, I'm not a fan of Gaetz, despite the spin some will try and put on this post, but I do ask for clarity before I start gnashing my teeth and pulling my hair.
I agree with your sentiment here, because it is a common tactic to put what is called a "poison pill" in there to force exactly that. However, based on the text of the bill, I'm not finding any pork.
There were also no amendments to the bill, so it actually passed clean which is something that happens only when they are looking to pass a bill with bipartisan support that they know will have widespread appeal. Now, usually legislators will have some excuse for not voting for a bill like this, and I am sure Gaetz will come up with something (I did look and I didn't see anything from him, yet). However, it's just a bad look when he is under investigation for sex trafficking that he would vote against this bill.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
(07-28-2022, 12:05 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I remember watching Al Franken (who I quite like) thoroughly dismantle claims against John Kerry voting against military funding.
He thoroughly dismantled the claims by pointing out how much pork, or add-ons, were added to the bill that caused the no vote. Since that time I have never taken "X voted no against X" at face value. Was there a specific reason? Was there an add-on that caused the no vote? I know asking such questions is painful for pure partisan hacks, but these are questions I'd liked asked, and answered, before I condemn someone for their vote. Note, I'm not a fan of Gaetz, despite the spin some will try and put on this post, but I do ask for clarity before I start gnashing my teeth and pulling my hair.
Academically this makes sense, but Matt Gaetz has done a lot to earn his reputation. The guy was born to use and mold the system for his own advantage.
Hopefully he makes me eat so much crow for drawing this conclusion. But right now I feel like the only justification a republican needs to give for his vote is "democrats were voting the opposite way."
When there are only a handful of the party that vote against something like this bill had it's more performative than for a "good reason" no matter how good a reason they say they have.
But, as has been said, Gaetz earned this reputation. In fact he voted against another trafficking bill not long before the investigation into him came out.
(07-28-2022, 06:54 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: I agree with your sentiment here, because it is a common tactic to put what is called a "poison pill" in there to force exactly that. However, based on the text of the bill, I'm not finding any pork.
There were also no amendments to the bill, so it actually passed clean which is something that happens only when they are looking to pass a bill with bipartisan support that they know will have widespread appeal. Now, usually legislators will have some excuse for not voting for a bill like this, and I am sure Gaetz will come up with something (I did look and I didn't see anything from him, yet). However, it's just a bad look when he is under investigation for sex trafficking that he would vote against this bill.
Oh, I completely agree it's a bad look, which made me really question why he would vote that way. I don't think the man is dumb, hence my thinking there was a reason for the no vote. I'll be very interested to see what that reason is.
(07-28-2022, 08:37 AM)Nately120 Wrote: Academically this makes sense, but Matt Gaetz has done a lot to earn his reputation. The guy was born to use and mold the system for his own advantage.
Hopefully he makes me eat so much crow for drawing this conclusion. But right now I feel like the only justification a republican needs to give for his vote is "democrats were voting the opposite way."
Very possible, and the low number of no votes does lend itself to that conclusion. As Bel stated above, it's a bad look considering what's going on with him.
(07-28-2022, 11:20 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Oh, I completely agree it's a bad look, which made me really question why he would vote that way. I don't think the man is dumb
I would think that would be a quite apparent explanation. Maybe the man is just dumb. That he's in Congress imho would not refute that assertion. The fact that he was so careless with his whole lewd affairs, however, seems to be an indication that he might be. Eg. apparently he showed around candid photos of his conquests on the house floor, which is just, well, a pretty dumb thing to do.
As imho is the suggestion that everyone deliberatly infect themselves with Covid, or that he brought a Holocaust denier as guest to the SOTU, illegally used tax payer money to pay a extreme right-wing person as speechwriter (and got caught), implied - rather said out loud - that women that are most vehemently in favor of abortion rights are ugly and no one wants to impregnate them anyway, and tried to get Norway to nominate Trump for the nobel peace prize. Oh and he openly threatened Michael Cohen one day before his testimony in Congress, lead this incredibly embarrassing stunt of storming into a classified impeachment hearing, called the texts of those two FBI love birds (Page and Strzok) the greatest coincidence since the immaculate reception and then could not explain what this even means. He slammed Hunter Biden for substance abuse and then suffered the obvious counter that he himself was arrested for DUI. Maybe he's dumb.
(07-28-2022, 11:20 AM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Oh, I completely agree it's a bad look, which made me really question why he would vote that way. I don't think the man is dumb, hence my thinking there was a reason for the no vote. I'll be very interested to see what that reason is.
Very possible, and the low number of no votes does lend itself to that conclusion. As Bel stated above, it's a bad look considering what's going on with him.
Yep but bad looks only matter if voters care. He seems politically invincible.
It's not enough that he does amoral things, he has to brag that he did them and flex that he is above the law and simultaneously whine that he's being unfairly persecuted. He's just gloriously awful.
(07-28-2022, 12:23 PM)hollodero Wrote: I would think that would be a quite apparent explanation. Maybe the man is just dumb. That he's in Congress imho would not refute that assertion. The fact that he was so careless with his whole lewd affairs, however, seems to be an indication that he might be. Eg. apparently he showed around candid photos of his conquests on the house floor, which is just, well, a pretty dumb thing to do.
As imho is the suggestion that everyone deliberatly infect themselves with Covid, or that he brought a Holocaust denier as guest to the SOTU, illegally used tax payer money to pay a extreme right-wing person as speechwriter (and got caught), implied - rather said out loud - that women that are most vehemently in favor of abortion rights are ugly and no one wants to impregnate them anyway, and tried to get Norway to nominate Trump for the nobel peace prize. Oh and he openly threatened Michael Cohen one day before his testimony in Congress, lead this incredibly embarrassing stunt of storming into a classified impeachment hearing, called the texts of those two FBI love birds (Page and Strzok) the greatest coincidence since the immaculate reception and then could not explain what this even means. He slammed Hunter Biden for substance abuse and then suffered the obvious counter that he himself was arrested for DUI. Maybe he's dumb.
Dear lord, I admit I'm a tad embarrassed that you know so much more about the guy than I do. The only thing I recall hearing about him was the under age accusation. I will say, when you look at the other no votes it doesn't exactly read like an all star team.
(07-28-2022, 12:34 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Yep but bad looks only matter if voters care. He seems politically invincible.
It's not enough that he does amoral things, he has to brag that he did them and flex that he is above the law and simultaneously whine that he's being unfairly persecuted. He's just gloriously awful.
Yeah, like I mentioned above I hadn't heard about a fair number of the things Hollo mentioned. I've certainly seen articles with his name in the headline, but I must not have been interested enough to actually read the article.
(07-28-2022, 06:54 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Yeah, like I mentioned above I hadn't heard about a fair number of the things Hollo mentioned. I've certainly seen articles with his name in the headline, but I must not have been interested enough to actually read the article.
Meh, it's not really worth keeping up with. The latest is that he posted a pic of some 19 year old who was protesting for the pro-choice side and saying that she was proof pro choice women didn't need to protest because they are too fat and ugly to get pregnant and she used that publicity to raise a buttload of money for the cause. So whoops on him, I guess.
The idea of a sitting member of congress shitposting about how fat and ugly a woman is on social media is stupid enough, but come on...he looks like a real life version of Beavis, for pete's sake. Lordy, the guy is like the smug sentence "Do you know who my dad is?!" came to life.
(07-28-2022, 06:54 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Dear lord, I admit I'm a tad embarrassed that you know so much more about the guy than I do. The only thing I recall hearing about him was the under age accusation. I will say, when you look at the other no votes it doesn't exactly read like an all star team.
Don't be. He would not really be worth the attention; he just fascinates me. How people like that could even be elected. My country is so much smaller than the US, a tiny pool of people in comparison, and while we indeed have weird people in politics a guy like him could not even be in a small village's local council here. In the so much bigger, more powerful and overall way more brilliant US, he sits in Congress and gets reelected. The two-party system strikes again.
(07-28-2022, 07:06 PM)Nately120 Wrote: Meh, it's not really worth keeping up with. The latest is that he posted a pic of some 19 year old who was protesting for the pro-choice side and saying that she was proof pro choice women didn't need to protest because they are too fat and ugly to get pregnant and she used that publicity to raise a buttload of money for the cause. So whoops on him, I guess.
The idea of a sitting member of congress shitposting about how fat and ugly a woman is on social media is stupid enough, but come on...he looks like a real life version of Beavis, for pete's sake. Lordy, the guy is like the smug sentence "Do you know who my dad is?!" came to life.
![[Image: giphy.gif]](https://media0.giphy.com/media/1kwsTjL8BNqlszNtnCE/giphy.gif)
![[Image: 4CV0TeR.png]](https://i.imgur.com/4CV0TeR.png)
