Matt Gaetz’s Personality Irked His GOP Colleagues. There Are Better Reasons To Oppose His Nomination.
If he is confirmed as President-elect Donald Trump’s attorney general, former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz would replace Merrick Garland, a onetime Supreme Court nominee who served two prior stints in the Justice Department, worked as a corporate litigator, and served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit for more than two decades, including seven years as chief judge. Garland’s predecessor, William Barr, likewise had previously worked for the Justice Department, including as attorney general during the George H.W. Bush administration, in addition to earlier legal work at the CIA and in private practice.
Going down the list of attorneys general before Barr, you will see people with extensive legal experience, including former prosecutors, Justice Department officials, judges, and state attorneys general. Gaetz, by contrast, is a 42-year-old graduate of William & Mary Law School who briefly worked for a law firm in Fort Walton Beach before entering state politics in 2010, two years after he was admitted to the Florida bar. He served in Florida’s legislature for six years before he was elected to represent the state’s 1st Congressional District in 2016.
Gaetz’s skimpy legal background is not the only reason many people, including Republican colleagues as well as Democrats, were dismayed by Trump’s choice. As Reason‘s C.J. Ciaramella noted, Rep. Mike Simpson (R–Idaho) “summed up the general reaction” on Capitol Hill with this response to news of the nomination: “Are you shittin’ me?” When asked what he thought about Gaetz as attorney general, Sen. John Cornyn (R–Texas) was a bit more diplomatic, saying, “I’m trying to absorb all of this.” Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R–Alaska) said Gaetz is “not a serious candidate.” The New York Times describes him as “one of the most reviled members of his conference.”
To be sure, politicians can be “reviled” for good or bad reasons. A legislator who shakes things up by standing on principle and resisting business as usual in Congress, which is how Gaetz is apt to portray himself, is bound to antagonize the establishment. But in Gaetz’s case, the main source of intraparty hostility is the perception that he is a lightweight showboat who is desperate for attention, fond of political stunts, inclined toward intemperate rhetoric, vindictive, and eager to start fires just to see things burn.
In these respects, Gaetz resembles Trump, whom he has vociferously defended for years. As Trump sees it, Gaetz’s loyalty is his main qualification to run the Justice Department. But it raises obvious concerns for anyone who worries that Trump will act on his often expressed desire to punish his political opponents once he is back in power. Intalling a sycophant at the top of the Justice Department would go a long way toward helping him deliver on those threats.
Gaetz’s allegiance to Trump, of course, hardly counts as a strike against him in the current Republican Party. In any case, his tendency to irritate his fellow Republicans predates his connection to the former and future president, and it seems to reflect obnoxious personality traits rather than controversial policy positions.
As a state representative in 2015, Gaetz opposed a “revenge porn” bill that made it a first-degree misdemeanor to post sexually explicit photos on a website without the subject’s consent. Understandably, the bill’s sponsor, Rep. Tom Goodson (R–Titusville), was not happy about that. But there was an additional element to their dispute.
“There is personal animosity between Goodson, a 64-year-old road contractor with a drawl who sometimes becomes tongue-tied during debates, and Gaetz, a 33-year-old lawyer with a sharp wit but an often-condescending manner,” Florida Trend reported. “During a session on the House floor last year, Gaetz peppered Goodson with questions about an arcane piece of legislation dealing with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Commission. The interrogation appeared to be an attempt to make Goodson appear unprepared or foolish.” During that exchange, a microphone caught Goodson calling Gaetz an “asshole.”
That assessment would later be echoed by Republicans who worked alongside Gaetz in Congress. His style was exemplified by his decision to wear a gas mask during a House debate about COVID-19 spending in early March 2020. There were sound reasons to question the government response to the pandemic, including state and local restrictions as well as the eventual approval of $6.2 trillion in federal spending that was rife with fraud and waste. But according to Gaetz himself, he was not mocking the government’s response.
When Washington Post reporter Philip Rucker said Gaetz had “made light of [the] coronavirus by wearing a gas mask,” the congressman implausibly insisted that his stunt had been misunderstood. “Made light?!?!” he wrote on Twitter. “I was quite serious. The threat to Congress is real, as I explained, based on travel and habits like selfies and handshakes.” Gaetz, in short, got the attention he wanted without making any substantive point, let al
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