they had joel greenberg on other matters. there's a hard question, why not matt gaetz in this situation. some would point to the fact that he's the privileged son of a financially fell-off political family, indictment of our own justice system. witnesses make bad witnesses. this is the most important, there's a victim that is identified in this report. an underage child or a child who based on the allegations in the report, credible information, would be a victim of statutory rape. and so, why then does the house ethics committee release the report? first, they have a different standard than the court system. their's is a congressional standard. they can do whatever they want. it's well known naught resigned so he was outside of the us jurisdiction of the congress. the committee told us, one, there's an overwhelming public interest. that's true. allegation of drug use and statutory rape by a sitting member of the congress, there's a public interest, particularly i suppose when they're still relevant politically. i think ultim

, joel greenberg provided cooperation as part of his plea agreement to law enforcement. i would hazard to say and i want to manage people's expectations that, if there was evidence that was provided by joel greenberg that was corroborated in some way because there is concern about his credibility, one person probably received it. i agree there's nothing new but i keep emphasizing the size of this report and i keep showing this on the air. i want people to understand it's not just 42 pages but there's actual documentation and evidence that was considered by this ethics committee, and i think law enforcement, i don't know if they were asleep at the switch. i think there was enough probable cause for a number of state felonies that were violated by matt gaetz, and i am stunned there isn't more proactivity done by law enforcement. i would footnote that even though the department justice did not find the federal trafficking offenses were committed by matt gaetz when he flew to the bahamas into this other stuff by flying young girls over to see him, allegedly, in the state of

. >> and she was invited to that party by joel greenberg by her friend who had met joel on -- >> he'ss correct. when she arrived she testified she had sex with representative gaetz within minutes of arriving. >> within minutes of arriving. >> within minutes of arriving, yes. she was introduced to him, representative gaetz took her upstairs into the room and they had sex in one of the bed rooms upstairs. >> and was that a prearranged, paid for sex encounter? >> so that situation was a situation that joel greenberg would have arranged ahead of time. there was no payment from representative gaetz at that particular time. my clients testified that the payments came later on at separate events. >> and after that in that setting is that when your client sees the 17-year-old girl? >> it was at that same event in july of 2017 at another time later on in party she was walk outside towards the pool area, she looked to her right, and she saw her friend who was 17 at the time having sex with representative gaetz. >> and your client knew that that girl is 17. >> that's right. she was aware that he

the committee found that matt gaetz attended sex and drug parties with joel greenberg who the committee reports "pleaded guilty to six charges, including sex trafficking of victim a." sex trafficking of that 17-year- old girl. so matt gaetz's former best friend and frequent group sex partner, joel greenberg, is in prison tonight because of what he did to victim a and donald trump wanted matt gaetz to be attorney general of the united states of america after what he did to victim a according to the house ethics committee. elon musk wanted matt gaetz to be attorney general of the united states after raping victim a according to the house ethics committee. one of the women, young girls really, who matt gaetz paid for sex told the committee under oath, "it's frustrating to know i lived the reality that he denies." there has been some sloppy reporting today about exactly what matt gaetz denies. in fact -- and this is really important -- matt gaetz has not denied today a single factual assertion in the ethics committee report released today. in the past matt gaetz has issued blanket denials,

>> so, that situation was a situation that joel greenberg would have arranged ahead of time.m representative gaetz at that time. my clients testified that the payments came later on, at separate events. >> and after that, in that setting, is that when your client sees the 17-year-old girl? >> so, he is at that same event back in july of 2017, at another time later on in the party, she was walking outside towards the pool area, she looked to her right, and she saw her friend, who was 17 at the time, having sex with representative gaetz. >> and your client knew that that girl was 17? >> that's right. she was aware that her friend was under 17, as they went to high school together. >> they went to high school together, and that 17-year-old was still in high school? >> that's right. >> two days after that discussion on this program, donald trump got rid of matt gaetz and then nominated a new candidate for attorney general. joining our discussion now is congressman glenn ivey of maryland, he is a member of the house ethics committee and the house judiciary committee, also a former

joel greenberg, who was the property appraiser of seminole county was so brazen, he texted openly aboutatt gaetz, who would later be trump's choice for attorney general. matt gaetz says the department of justice's decision not to prosecute him is an exoneration of him. the report shows how false that is, and the report didn't just make matt gaetz look bad. it also made the department of justice look bad because the doj said they didn't have enough corroboration to move forward with an indictment, but the committee said they had multiple witnesses that said they saw matt gaetz have sex with this then 17-year-old girl, but something else in the report struck me, and that is the report said matt gaetz paid the young woman $400 in cash, not through venmo. that would seem to be a break from what he allegedly did with other young women. perhaps that's why the doj didn't charge here, they can't prove a commercial sex act to prove human trafficking you have to show an exchange of money or something of value. since this was cash and not venmo, perhaps the doj said, you know, we don't trust these

where this report says that matt gaetz was involved well violated that law, this individual, joel greenbergs serving 11 years in prison with respect to sexual misconduct related to that individual. so just in terms of thinking about, our justice system and relative culpability of individuals, the idea that one is in prison for that long, and the person he cooperated against, and the judge in that case, said joel greenberg provided such incredible cooperation in 22 years on the bench, it was the most substantial cooperation he had ever seen and the prosecutor said yes, he's provided substantial cooperation and you should sentence him to a more lenient sentence because of that. so they weren't doubting his credibility and they said he was a good cooperator, and one of the people who is cooperating against matt gaetz, no charges, nothing happens to him. it reminds me, it's a parallel really to michael cohen, you know, when michael cohen served three years for campaign- finance violations, and then the person he cooperated against, the person is providing information against trump, nothing happ

the only stuff that we know about gaetz comes from the case of joel greenberg the florida local tax collectorho pled guilty, some statements made in relation to his case. but we never saw an indictment of gaetz because he was never charged. we were never given an explanation by the department were he was not charged. what you have in this document is probably the most authoritative report on matt gaetz' conduct ever created. all we know about matt gaetz is a lot base on news paper stories, based on stuff dating back to 2021 when we first wrote about his investigation. so this would be a lot of different allegations about gaetz and his conduct when he was in, you know alleged to have done these things when he was in the house in 2017 when he was in the house. and that could be pretty damaging to him. now, maybe damaging in a classical sense of damaging. not in a trumpian. >> not contemporary sense. >> the classical sense. so, what that means for matt gaetz. the thing i think about with matt gaetz after he say he was not going to try to become attorney general he said maybe i will be a special

he dodged a prosecution, but his close friend, his running buddy joel greenberg is in prison now becausee in being engaged with teenage prostitutes. i mean, we can't overemphasize this is the kind of thing in maga that were a democrat were involved in this, they would be burning the building down screaming about pedophiles and perversion and dedegeneracy. and yet with matt, it took a real act of bravery here for them to release this because he is threatening to expose other members. et cetera. it is a mess. but they are not going the have matt to kick around much longer. he is off to host his own little web show. >> i want you to read a part of his response here. it is very telling. he says it is embarrassing, not criminal, that i partied, womanized and drank more than i should have earlier in life. i live a different life now. that is his response to allegations that he paid an underage girl and other women for sex. >> i mean, this is his pole on the road to damascus moment on twitter. we are talking underaged girls. we are talking about his coconspirator in this case also serving feder

it's a chart that the "times" obtained that shows pictures of matt gaetz and his friend joel greenbergh links to women and payments. the document assembled by investigators during a three-year sex trafficking investigation into mr. gaetz, is a chart that shows a web of thousands of dollars in venmo payments between mr. gaetz and a group of his friends, associates, and women who had drug-fueled sex parties between 2017 and 2020. according to testimony, the participants are said to have given to federal congressional investigators. >> seth: look at that diagram. that looks like something you get back from 23andme except it's 17andme. now, this is -- [ laughter ] [ audience ohs ] no -- the "me" is matt. [ laughter ] this is the creepiest edition of "where's waldo" i've ever seen. [ light laughter ] it's like one of those richard scarry books where you have to find goldbug. let's see. where is he? oh, there he is. right next to matt. there. [ laughter ] wait, but they can't all fit in goldbug's bugdozer. so, who drove to the sex parties? oh! not you, lowly worm. and if this chart were abou

um, they, you know, having to deal with witnesses like joel greenberg and others who have really terrible records for credibility, that sort of thing. but nevertheless, they should have to provide, i think some, uh, some, some answers to congressional overseers. as for the state level, there is nothing to prevent state prosecutors from going down this road. now, would they have to eventually deal with the fact that the feds took a look at it and said, no, probably. but nevertheless, i think misty is absolutely right. like anything that gaetz says publicly about this, that could possibly be cast as an admission is is wildly against his interests and a really bad idea. and i think we'll it's yet to be seen if we're going to hear more from mr. gaetz in the coming hours, if not days. andrew mccabe misty marris. thank you both so much for your analysis. really appreciate it. >> thank you. >> all right. still ahead, president elect donald trump gives new insight into his second term agenda while also pushing back against democratic claims that elon musk is actually the one in charge. plus, a ma

, actually this comes right down to my hometown, because this investigation initiated because joel greenberga county i represented when i served in congress. he has been investigated and i think as part of his cooperation with law enforcement, these issues regarding matt gaetz came to light. so there was a subsequent investigation there. i think what's important is that now that the information has been made public, the onus is on the florida officials as to whether or not they find enough that he was they need to move forward, because, again, nobody is above the law. i think it's important for people who live in florida who are represented by him and who want to have faith in the people that they elect and send to congress, for them to see that no member of congress is above the law. i also think it's important for the public to understand exactly the extent of his actions and to see him held accountable and certainly to be able to include that in their calculus should he run for higher office in this state or federally. >> april, i want to go to you. you and have been around d.c. for a whi