if that's true, joining us now is mark caputo national reporter who added the new details in the mattaetz story. thank you for being here. >> thanks for having me. appreciate it. >> nobody knows florida politics or rights about florida politics quite like you. i'm happy to talk to you about this story. i'm happy to know what more of what you know about it. did you see any of this coming once the joel greenberg case broke open last year? his friendship and relationship with congressman gaetz was not a secret. >> it wasn't. i think the alice in wonder land line, curiouser and curiouser comes to mind. it gets weirder and weirder. a mutual friend of a lawyer who represented the political opponent of greenberg had reached out to me many months ago and said, hey, you should interview this guy because joel greenberg the tax collector tried to smear him as a pedophile and now arrested for it. and then that just mushroomed out into this really bizarre investigation. so, you know, every day there is a new allegation. unfortunately, i can't discuss all of the things that we've been making calls

joining me now, david jolly and mark caputo, national political reporter for politico. o start with you, mark. matt gaetz seems to me to be on a smaller and smaller island. donald trump isn't there to save him and it seems like he did have a lot of haters inside trump world who were rolling their eyes before and are now snickering at him and he went up against liz cheney who's still in republican leadership and he's sailing out to sea. where does he stand, as far as you know, politically? >> he's told his friends that he's in the minority of the minority. he didn't come to congress as the former congressman and his colleague can tell you to make friends and matt gaetz quickly decided that he wasn't going to have a lot of influence doing policy and legislating, he was going to be trump's number one guy on fox news. well, now that trump is gone, and now that republicans are in the minority of the house, and now that he's gone after folks like liz cheney and torched a lot of people, again, you feel like he's in the minority of the minority. he was looking at an exit plan to

also with me, mark caputo. he wrote about gaetz and greenberg. mark, let me start with you.not someone who shies from the camera. in fact that seems to be why he's in politics, quite frankly. so, even facing very, very significant legal exposure, which i think any competent lawyer would advise you to shut up about, he's not going to do that. what was going on tonight? >> yeah, what was going on tonight was gaetz being gaetz. he's of the school that if he is quiet, he looks guilty. he has lawyers talking for him, he looks guilty. and he's kind of an always on influence republican, a maga republican. and just a few days ago he accepted the this long-standing invitation to come speak, for obvious reasons. he wanted to kind of plant his flag to say i'm not going anywhere. i think that's almost a direct quote of what he said tonight. and he has had kind of a week of attempted counter programming knowing there's going to be a steady drip, drip, drip of bad information. after all he was associated with joel greenberg. these guys were engaged in activity that a lot of people find ve

mark caputo for politico florida. jennifer rogers, a former assistant u.s.ttorney for the southern district of new york. good to have you on. good evening. jennifer first. i want your reaction to the stunning "new york times" report that gaetz sought a blanket pardon from the former president during his final weeks in office. the white house lawyers reportedly saw it as a non-starter. this is a clip from gaetz, his appearance on fox in november and then we'll talk. >> president trump should pardon michael flynn, pardon the thanksgiving turkey, pardon everyone from himself, his administration officials from joe exotic if he has to. you see from the radical left a blood loss that will only be quenched if they come after the people who work hard to animate the trump administration with the policies and the vigor and the effectiveness that delivered for the american people. so i think that the president ought to wield that pardon power effectively and robustly. >> oh, boy. so "the new york times" says that is unclear if gaets fwaits or the white house knew about

joining our conversation, mark caputo, writer for politico. of it about the wingman-like bromance between these two men. as we talk about heightened legal peril for matt gaetz, it's important to understand how close they were, right, and how much legal jeopardy mr. greenberg is in today. >> yeah. he's facing a world of hurt. greenberg has 33 charges, ranging from sex trafficking a minor, host of financial crimes. five days after he first got indicted he quit his days as tax collector. according to the indictment he committed c.a.r.e.s act fraud. in the case of gaetz and his allies, they're monitoring what greenberg is going to do. if he happens to testify against him, greenberg has some problems, credibility problem as a potential witness. one of the charges that he's facing is falsely smearing a rival as a pedophile and having sex with the 17-year-old. whatsapp also details how greenberg, according to the chat, sort of tried to enlist others into his defense, the person he was discussing this with was a mutual friend of greenberg and gaetz. a

. >> i am joined by mark caputo, senior reporter for politico, well known for his knowledge of florida politics. he broke the story about the taped call and what it could implicate. also joined by civil rights attorney, has extensive experience in these related types of cases. welcome to you both. mark, what did you find? >> we found i think you set it up pretty well, one of matt gaetz's ex-girlfriends, main ex-girlfriend, when you talk to mutual friends, said they had an open relationship, saw other people, she reported to them she was nervous that the young woman who was at the center or was key to the sex trafficking of a minor charge, that gaetz's friend joel greenberg had been hit with, she at a certain point after greenberg was indicted for sex trafficking of a minor called her, gaetz's ex-girlfriend, and gaetz's ex-girlfriend said she didn't want to cooperate and she was a little nervous, just had her spidey sense tingling, thought she was being recorded, that it was a setup phone call. now she's worried according to friends about being hit with obstruction charge or something t

. >> all right, florida man mark caputo. let's talk florida man matt gaetz and joe greenberg. what's going on? >> toluse was also a florida man. we used to work together at the "miami herald," by the way. that's a great question. it's one of the ultimate stories. tax collector joel greenberg is under indictment. one of the accounts is he had sex with a minor, sex trafficking. matt gaetz, his friend since 2016, is now wrapped up in this in kind of a really bizarre tale. cbs is reporting federal prosecutors is as examining an overseas trip that matt gaetz made with friends and others in the bahamas. they claim there were escorts and there's a question whether there was any sex with minors that occurred there. matt gaetz has been kind of notably knocked on his heels by just a crush of allegations for the past week. i do also think it's notable, though, we haven't had any names that have come out so far, no other accusers have come forward, nor have we seen any, you know, old irrefutable evidence or data. we're all sitting around waiting for that to point that out. >> another thin