Mike Johnson—Who Monitors Porn Intake With Son—Doesn’t Care If Matt Gaetz Is a Sex Pest

Barf Bag: On Wednesday, Johnson said he wasn't going to get involved with the House's report into Matt Gaetz's sex trafficking allegations; on Thursday, he hung out with Trump and Gaetz; on Friday, he said the Committee should definitely not release the report. Interesting!

By Lauren Tousignant | November 15, 2024 | 7:54pm

Photo: Getty Images Politics

Mike Johnson—Who Monitors Porn Intake With Son—Doesn’t Care If Matt Gaetz Is a Sex Pest

Welcome back to Barf Bag.

The United States of America: Land of the sex pests and home of the we’re fucked. OK, not everyone in the U.S. is a sex pest, but a much too large portion of our incoming administration is. In the last week, Donald Trump, an infamous sex pest himself, has nominated three people to government positions who have sexual assault, sexual misconduct, or sex trafficking allegations against them: Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Pete Hegseth, and the vile and hated former Rep. Matt Gaetz. I’ve truly never been prouder to be an American.

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Gaetz’s nomination to attorney general, in particular, is causing a ton of drama, mostly because Gaetz has been accused of sex trafficking a 17-year-old. This obviously feels like a thing that should cause a lot of drama but, in my opinion, it’s not causing as much as it should!

The Department of Justice (which would be led by Gaetz if he gets confirmed) investigated Gaetz between 2021 and 2023 over allegations that he trafficked a minor and brought her to a party in 2017. Ultimately, the DOJ didn’t charge him, but the House Ethics Committee has been conducting its own investigation, and they were allegedly set to release their report on Friday. Curiously, Gaetz resigned from the House on Wednesday after Trump nominated him. He claims it was to expedite the process of finding his replacement, but the more likely explanation is that now, the House has no jurisdiction over him. Which means they might never release the report.

On Friday, House Speaker Mike Johnson—who maybe isn’t a sex pest, but is definitely a sex weirdo—weighed in, even though he said he wouldn’t earlier in the week. But I’m sure his change of heart had nothing to do with the fact that he spent Thursday night at a Mar-a-Lago gala with Trump and Gaetz.

“I’m going to strongly request the Ethics Committee not issue the report, because that is not how we do things in the House and I think that would be a terrible precedent to set,” Johnson told reporters on Friday. “I think it’s a terrible breach of protocol and tradition and the spirit of the rule.”

But on Wednesday, Johnson had this to say about the whole ordeal: “As far as the timing of a release report or something, I don’t know. The Speaker of the House is not involved in that — can’t be involved in that.” Interesting!

Also, if you forgot, Gaetz led the charge to oust former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy in October 2023, the first time in history a Speaker was removed. Gaetz said it was because McCarthy worked with Democrats on a spending bill, but McCarthy maintains that Gaetz wanted him gone because he wouldn’t stop the Ethics Committee’s investigation and refused to get involved.

“I believe it is very important to maintain the House’s tradition of not issuing Ethics reports on people who are no longer members of Congress,” Johnson said on Friday. But The Hill reported that this “tradition” was broken in 1987, when the House released its report into former Rep. William Boner (D-Tenn.) after he resigned. “I think it would open a Pandora’s box,” Johnson concluded. “It’s a very important rule that should be maintained — if it’s been broken once or twice, it should not have been.”

What’s definitely been broken, however, are Republicans’ brains, because all this drama seems to be causing some infighting. All the non-MAGA Republicans in Congress are freaking out over Gaetz getting nominated to AG; Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio) told HuffPost on Wednesday that “Gaetz has a better shot at having dinner with Queen Elizabeth II than being confirmed by the Senate” and Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) said “Are you shittin’ me?” when asked for comment. Meanwhile, on Friday, multiple GOP senators called on the House to still release the report, with Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) saying he’d be open to subpoenaing the House panel if they refuse.

It’s been 10 days since Trump was elected and this is where we’re at: An anti-sex, anti-abortion Republican who has a porn-monitoring app and says that his son is his porn “accountability partner” is backing up a MAGA Republican who’s been investigated for sex trafficking and who used to show fellow Congress members videos of women he’d slept with, in order to help him become the most powerful lawyer in the land. God bless America.

Trump is not doing FBI background checks on some of his cabinet picks. [CNN]
Tom Homan, Trump’s new border czar and a Project 2025 contributor, told Donald Trump Jr. there will be “shock and awe” on day one. Yikes. [Mediate]
The Onion actually achieved the funniest thing possible and bought Alex Jones‘ InfoWars at a bankruptcy auction. [New York Times]
Melania Trump‘s memoir is reportedly covered in “sticky goo.” [Vanity Fair]
The FBI is investigating racist, homophobic, and anti-migrant text messages that have been sent to people of color and the LGBTQ community following Trump’s election. [The Guardian]
Jesse Watters‘ mom uninvited him to Thanksgiving. [Daily Beast]
Trump said he’s going to rid schools of “wokeness” and “left-wing indoctrination.” Sweet. [ABC News]
Not sure how he’ll achieve federal legislation like the above without a Department of Education, but I don’t expect him to understand things. [Washington Post]
Vomit-inducing headline: “Judge James Ho Kicks Off The Auditions For Trump’s Next Supreme Court Pick” [HuffPost]
Bankrupt Rudy Giuliani finally turned over his Mercedez-Benz lmao. [Politico]

This has been your weekly Barf Bag, thanks for reading!

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