Thursday dawned on Capitol Hill with little sign of respite for a Senate Republican caucus clearly still coming to terms with getting what they bargained for.
Senators returned for the second day of business in the midst of Gaetz-gate: the multi-day freakout taking place over the nomination of Matt Gaetz, the Republican gadfly and Trump loyalist from Florida, to serve as Donald Trump’s attorney general.
And what was an open question on Wednesday is now a whispered certainty: Gaetz did not, as he clearly intended, dodge an imminent report from the House Ethics Committee regarding longstanding allegations that he slept with a 17-year-old girl — a highschooler — while serving as a member of Congress.
Gaetz was previously investigated in the matter by the Justice Department, which he will now seek to lead; it ended with no charges brought against him. He has strongly denied the allegations.
The Florida congressman reportedly became Trump’s pick for attorney general after convincing the president-elect during a trip on Trump Force One this week — just hours before the decision was announced on Wednesday.
He then promptly resigned from the House, officially ending the Ethics panel’s jurisdiction to file the report.
The Ethics Committee will meet on Friday to determine the official fate of that investigation. Unofficially? It’s all but certain to be released, whether by the committee in the days immediately ahead, or through a leak to the press, or from the Senate. Several GOP senators said on Wednesday and Thursday that they wanted to see the Ethics report released before voting on the ex-congressman’s confirmation.
One highly-sourced Florida reporter said the unofficial release could come within hours, not days.
“I think there should not be any limit on the Senate Judiciary Committee’s investigation,” John Cornyn, who sits on the panel which will vote on whether to advance Gaetz’s confirmation, said on Thursday.
Kevin Cramer, another Republican aligned with the chamber’s institutionalists, said that the congressman had a “steep hill to climb” for votes in the chamber — including his own.
He added that Gaetz could lose as many as 10 GOP votes or more in the Senate if a vote were held this week.
John Thune, the incoming majority leader and successor to Mitch McConnell, had a more measured response to questions about whether Gaetz could win enough votes for confirmation on Thursday.
“I haven't given that any thought yet. I just know that the nomination isn't formalized yet, but when it is, we'll process it in the way we typically do and provide our advise and consent.”
So what does this mean for Donald Trump’s other nominees? Trump made good on a campaign promise to nominate Robert F Kennedy Jr., vaccine skeptic and conspiracist, to lead America’s largest public health agency on Thursday, prompting further groans from a Senate GOP caucus already unhappy to face journalists’ questions in the hallway.
It also opens up the question of whether Trump will truly resort to recess appointments to ram Gaetz and others through — a ploy that could quickly sour his relationship with the Republican caucus, and endanger his legislative agenda (such as it is).
In the end, Gaetz could very well end up the sacrificial lamb — the Trump nominee that goes down in flames while others like Kennedy and Tulsi Gabbard are confirmed. To Cramer’s point, the Senate, too, will have to expend political capital to oppose Trump’s nominees, lest Republicans risk the wrath of the president-elect or his supporters.
