Raw Story: Merrick Garland's DOJ criticized for impeding Ethics Committee's Matt Gaetz investigation

[Dennis Donovan]

Raw Story - Merrick Garland's DOJ criticized for impeding Ethics Committee's Matt Gaetz investigation

Sarah K. Burris
December 23, 2024 1:16PM ET

The House Ethics Committee revealed its report on former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) on Monday — with its authors complaining that Merrick Garland's Department of Justice stopped it from carrying out a more through investigation.

In its report, which alleged that Gaetz paid an underage girl for sex, among other claims, the Ethics Committee asserts: "The Committee was not able to speak with every woman who received payments from Representative Gaetz that were suspected of being part of illicit activity. Several women initially were responsive to the Committee’s outreach but later told the Committee they would not voluntarily participate. Other women were clear at first contact that they feared retaliation or were unwilling to voluntarily relive their interactions with Representative Gaetz."

"Due to the women’s reluctance to cooperate, as well as the delay caused by DOJ’s deferral request and subsequent refusal to provide meaningful cooperation, the Committee was unable to determine the full extent to which Representative Gaetz’s payments to women were compensation for engaging in sexual activity with him," the committee report continued.

The committee said that the information they did have access to "provides substantial reason to believe that many of the payments in the chart [below] were made in connection with sexual activity and/or illicit drug use."

The chart calculates funds paid to 12 women who spoke to the committee.

/snip

[yankee87]

1. Garland being a disappointment

I'm just so sick of Garland and his lack of doing anything, there's nothing that could be done to make me hate him more.

[Sneederbunk]

2. The book expose on Garland term will be a doozy.

[Bobstandard]

4. Worse than a disappointment, he's a disaster

It’s coming into focus that Garland wasn’t just slow, he appears more and more to have been responsible for impeding investigations into Trump and Republican wrong doing. Which brings us to the disaster of another term for Trump and a whole new band of fascists and looters. Thanks Garland.

[Rebl2]

28. Yes

Disaster is the best term to use regarding him.

[rampartd]

33. and trump will pay him back with "retribution"

karma may be the best justice we can hope for this trojan horse, and the relief that he is not a supreme court justice.

[NotHardly]

18. Garland and his crew are expensive jokes

[Blue_Tires]

27. He was a chaos agent from the start

[uponit7771]

3. Yeah, DOJ had probable cause to arrest Gaetz long ago ... this is disgusting

[yankee87]

7. MAGA Justice

Let's face it MAGA never gets arrested for their crimes.

[uponit7771]

11. Should be called NAGA ... Never Again Get Arrested

[Wiz Imp]

26. For what? Serious question. Being a scumbag isn't illegal.

Most of the tings the report detailed are serious ethical violations but not necessarily against the law. I'm pretty sure the statute of limitations on the statutory rape ran out before the DOJ even took the case.

[uponit7771]

31. Mann Act

[Wiz Imp]

32. Both the DOJ and the Ethics Committee concluded there wasn't sufficient evidence for that charge.

No way would the DOJ make an indictment in a case like this if they weren't confident they could get a conviction. And based on the info in the report, it's easy to see why they didn't think the could get a conviction.

[gab13by13]

5. I'm going to wait for Marcy Wheeler

to explain everything. She has been very quiet lately about Garland.

I was wrong about Garland early on, I thought he was afraid of Trump, now I believe he was complicit all along.

[Irish_Dem]

6. He crossed the line from cautious to complicit a long time ago.

[CrispyQ]

10. This was the final straw.

There was absolutely no excuse for the slow responses to this by the archives, by the feds, or by the DOJ. Trump should have been arrested & locked up immediately & every one of his residences thoroughly searched. His entire life should have been put under a microscope. This pic just enrages me.

Saving democracy was the number one motivation dems told voters in 2020 & it was again in 2024. And I don't put any of that on Harris. It's all on Biden & his selections to head various departments.

[Irish_Dem]

16. Exactly. Treason at the highest level putting US national security and military at severe risk.

And CIA assets.

Garland refused to take action, would not even search Trump's other residences.
CIA knows there are documents at other residences as we speak.

Garland could not care less.

[Think. Again.]

12. I believe the "cautious" period was all a lie.

He has always been the complicit federalist society plant we thought he was all along.

[Irish_Dem]

15. Another covert sleeper agent yes.

Like Sinema and Manchin.

[yankee87]

23. Bribed?

At best he was complicit. No one can be that bad at their job.

[Think. Again.]

20. I'm afraid so.

As accomplished as Biden is in politics, his innate goodness blinded him to the fact that over time, the republicans stopped being just a rival party and became a domestic enemy.

I think he realizes that now, I haven't heard him refer to his "friends across the aisle" in a couple of years.

[delisen]

9. Garland had been a compromise candidate for SC

When he was nominated by Obama for Supreme Court. He was seen as someone Republicans would likely vote for. McConnell quashed that hope and it would have been better if Biden nominated a stronger liberal for AG.

[W_HAMILTON]

13. Trump's MAGA moles in the DOJ doing their own "catch and kill" right under Garland's nose.

[paleotn]

21. You actually think serious allegations about a sitting member of Congress

would slip past or could be hidden from the AG? "Moles" or no "moles" that's not how it works.

[mackdaddy]

14. AG Milquetoast strike again at the heart of criminal behavior.

When seconds matter, Well let's think about it.

[Festivito]

17. Who criticized the DOJ? A strongly worded letter?

Enough money, a threat or two, and suddenly no testifying. No testimony, no conviction.

[paleotn]

19. Arguably the worst AG in American history.

One of Biden's few mistakes and by miles the most costly.

This complete and total failure to act is all because....supposedly.....we don't want to look "political." Well, there comes a point when the smart and observant realize that, hey!, I'm the only one playing by the goddamn rules. At that point, isn't it far wiser to put the damn rules aside? Too late now. The horse is in the next goddamn county.

[moniss]

22. "refusal to provide meaningful cooperation"

We need to unpack that phrase just a bit. There are investigations all the time with multiple parties investigating where one or the other wishes they had known something the other knew earlier but didn't because of confusion, logistics, uncertainty etc. That is not at all what we have here based on this phrase. The Committee is telling us in plain English that they asked for things from DOJ and DOJ actively refused. An affirmative step of refusal is different than a paperwork snafu, mistaken understanding etc. It is knowingly and purposely standing in the way of an investigation. That is obstruction and is a violation of 18 U.S.C 1505 which covers "obstruction of pending congressional or federal administrative proceedings".

But of course violations of Federal Statutes can only be prosecuted by........DOJ. So here we are America. We have a Supreme Court that says it is above the law and accountable to nobody for a lack of ethics that would make Billie Sol Estes look like a saint. Now we can add to that a DOJ that openly and willfully engaged in violation of a Federal Statute and so also demonstrates holding itself above the law.

But her e-mails. Heaven and Earth were moved and no stone left unturned, over and over again going through the same "materials, witnesses and evidence" to see if they could nail Hillary. But his gun form. Millions and millions of dollars spent investigating over the course of years, while listening to a witness whose credibility was never established from the start, and finally it comes down to paying some back taxes and making a common dodge about drug use while filling out a gun purchase form? DOJ/Special Counsel then prosecutes for things almost never prosecuted. But no Special Counsel for Gaetz?

Yet I, as a citizen, am supposed to believe in the rule of law? I am supposed to believe in "Equal Protection"?

[LW1977]

24. Fire him

Even if it’s only symbolic, fire that SOB!

[Emile]

25. Remember, we need to exercise patience. He

is crossing the T's and dotting the I's. Justice doesn't happen overnight.

[republianmushroom]

29. Merrick the Meek in action again, not being political.

Label the witness "unreliable", that should do it. Co-operate, hell no, you want to show our true colors.

47 months and counting

Jack 28 days left in the count down.

[GreenWave]

30. No more repugs heading DOJ or FBI. Way too partisan.

Of course our team must recapture our democracy and make those grifters pay it all back,