WASHINGTON—The House Ethics Committee released an explosive report detailing its investigation of sexual-misconduct allegations against ex-Rep. Matt Gaetz , a Florida Republican who abruptly resigned from Congress last month while under consideration for attorney general in the coming Trump administration.
The 37-page report , released Monday, said that Gaetz regularly paid for sex, including with a 17-year-old girl, from at least 2017 when he began serving in the House until 2020. It also found that he accepted impermissible gifts, including lodging and transportation in 2018 during a trip to the Bahamas. Investigators also concluded that Gaetz “used or possessed” cocaine and ecstasy between 2017 and 2019.
Two lawyers for Gaetz didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.
The ethics committee, made up of five lawmakers from each party, took the rare step of agreeing to release the report despite Gaetz’s departure from the chamber. Committee investigations typically end once a member leaves.
Ahead of the committee making the report public, Gaetz asked a federal judge Monday to block its release. Gaetz, who has denied all wrongdoing, in his suit said making the report public would violate the committee’s internal rules to stop investigating House lawmakers once they leave Congress, violating his constitutional due process rights.
The former lawmaker also sued for defamation, alleging the committee’s report falsely says he engaged in unethical misconduct. With the lawsuit, he filed a request for a temporary restraining order to keep the report private during court proceedings, saying the damage done to Gaetz’s reputation would be irreversible.
The committee opened its investigation into Gaetz, 42, more than three years ago. The Justice Department also investigated whether Gaetz engaged in sex-trafficking a minor, a probe that began during President-elect Donald Trump ’s first term and ended last year without criminal charges.
Gaetz last week blasted the committee following news reports that it planned to release the report, saying in a statement on social media “that I have no opportunity to debate or rebut as a former member of the body.”
Gaetz said that he lives differently now than he did when he was younger.
“My 30’s were an era of working very hard—and playing hard too,” he said. “It’s embarrassing, though not criminal, that I probably partied, womanized, drank and smoked more than I should have earlier in life.”
Investigators pieced together their findings by tracking payments that Gaetz made through platforms such as PayPal and Venmo.
Committee investigators said they weren’t able to interview every woman they suspected was paid by Gaetz for sex. Several women said they were worried about retaliation, while others said they were unwilling to relive their interactions with Gaetz.
All of the women interviewed by the committee said their relations with Gaetz were consensual. One woman said she “felt that the use of drugs at the parties and events they attended may have ‘impair[ed their] ability to really know what was going on or fully consent.”
It was previously reported that a witness told ethics committee investigators that she saw Gaetz having sex with a 17-year-old girl at a party in 2017, while he was serving in Congress, according to a lawyer for the witness. The witness and an additional person also told the panel that Gaetz paid them for sex, the lawyer said.
Committee officials in June said that the panel had spoken with more than a dozen witnesses, issued 25 subpoenas and reviewed thousands of pages of documents.
Gaetz resigned from Congress last month after Trump nominated him as attorney genera l. Gaetz later withdrew his name from consideration for that post as Republican senators pledged to thoroughly vet his past and expressed interest in obtaining the House ethics report.
He has said that he will join the conservative One America News Network as an anchor next month.
Write to Katy Stech Ferek at katy.stech@wsj.com
