Iowans Miller-Meeks, Hinson, Nunn and Feenstra Join the "Swamp" With Votes to Bury Ethics Committee Report on Gaetz
Standing up for Iowa's values? Hardly. Their votes rejected Iowa values.
If there ever was a question about whether all four Iowans in the U.S. House of Represntatives are full fledged members of the so-called “swamp” in Washington, DC that they rail against on the campaign trail in Iowa, that question was answered resoundingly with two votes all four cast in the House on Thursday, December 5.
That’s the day all four Iowans voted to block the public release of the report on the investigation and conclusions of U.S. House Ethics Committee into credible allegations of sexual misconduct involving minors, illicit drug use, money paid for sex, and other alleged illegal acts by then Congressman Matt Gaetz (R-FL).
The investigation had been on-going since May, 2023.
So there is no confusion, let’s say the names of the Iowans in Congress who think the results of that investigation are nobody’s business, and need to be hidden away.
Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks (R-1st IA)
Ashley Hinson (R-2nd IA)
Zach Nunn (R-3rd IA)
Randy Feenstra (R-4th IA)
Let history record: On December 5, 2024 - a date which will live in infamy in Iowa congressional delegation history (to borrow and tweak a phrase from President Franklin Roosevelt) these Iowans in Congress turned their backs on Iowa’s values instead of standing up for, and defending them.
That Gaetz would eventually wind up the subject of an Ethics Committee investigation someday was never really a question of “if” in Washington, but rather of “when.”
He has been a walking cess pool for some time.
Gaetz was the leader of a small group of extreme, right wing House Republicans who basically politically extorted Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) in the election for House Speaker in 2023, which took McCarthy 15 rounds of voting to win.
There have been multiple reports - including from fellow House members - that Gaetz showed nude cell phone photos or videos to colleagues on the House floor of young women with whom he claimed to have had sex. Not exactly an indicator of a strong moral or ethical compass.
An attorney for two women who testified before the House Ethics Committee, said one of the women saw Gaetz having sex with her friend - a minor - at party in Florida in 2017. The attorney, also said Gaetz paid the two for sex several times. Prostitution is illegal in Florida and Gaetz was a member of the House at the time.
The House Ethics Committee - composed of five Republicans and five Democrats - looked into all that and more. If the bi-partisan investigation by Gaetz’s House colleagues had exonerated him, found that he had been falsely accused, the Ethics Committee’s report would have said so.
The committee is composed of public men and women. They know that a public and political life too often means that false accusations and lies will be used as political weapons. Especially these days.
Bad actors frequently use Mark Twain’t old adage - which he meant as a warning, really - as their prompt: “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.”
If the committee had determined Gaetz was the victim of lies, they would not have hesitated to make put that conclusion in their report and make it public.
One would think that if Gaetz - and his fellow Republicans - thought the Ethics Committee report would exonerate him, they would want it released immediately.
But that’s not what happened. Gaetz - who knows all the facts, first hand - wanted the report kept from the public. So did his fellow Republicans, including all four Iowans.
In what appears to be a last ditch “Hail Mary” play, Gaetz resigned from the House just days before the report was to be released, a scheme that needed the cooperation of president-elect Trump (the nation’s most corrupt president ever, so not really a stretch to get him on the plan) to say he was nominating Gaetz to be Attorney General - a nomination no one in this town took seriously, not even from Trump. It was a “nomination” that clearly seemed aimed at salvaging at least some of Gaetz’s reputation because it could keep the Ethics Committee report hidden from the public.
The argument was that once Gaetz no longer a member of the House, the report couldn’t be released. Which isn’t accurate, because there is plenty of precedent for House Ethics Committee investigation reports being released after the subject of the investigation resigned from Congress.
But it was good enough, apparently - at least as flimsy cover - for every House Republican but one, including all four Iowans who voted to protect Gaetz from the contents of the report and the committee’s conclusions.
Even former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) says the nomination of Gaetz to be Attorney General appeared to be part of a scheme. “He needed an excuse to resign because the Ethics report would be done in a couple of days,” McCarthy said.
Let’s be clear: Iowans and all Americans have a right to know what public official Gaetz was up to as a member of the U.S. House.
They certainly have a right to know what he was up to once nominated by the president-elect for one of the most important cabinet posts in his incoming administration. The choice a president-elect makes for his Attorney General says a lot about the president-elect’s character and judgment. The American people have a right to know everything about that.
Why Iowa’s congressional delegation would play along with this blisteringly partisan, corrupt nonsense and walk away from Iowa’s values is beyond me.
This is the kind of corruption is something Iowans in Congress should protest, not enable with their votes.
Don McLean had a hit record in 1971, called “American Pie.” The song’s story was built around the tragic 1959 airplane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa that claimed the lives of budding rock and roll giants Buddy Holly, Richie Valens, the Big Bopper and their pilot Roger Peterson.
The song’s lyrics called the day the young musicians perished in Iowa, “The Day the Music Died.”
With their votes to deep six the Ethics Committee report, Iowa Reps. Miller-Meeks, Hinson, Nunn and Feenstra have made December 5, 2024 - at least as expressed by their votes in Congress, “The Day Iowa’s Values Died.”
None of Iowa’s congressional delegation is bashful about issuing press releases to proclaim the latest thing they want Iowans to know about them.
So it is odd, isn’t it?
Not one of them managed to get a press release out announcing that they voted to block public release of the House Ethics Committee report on its investigation of alleged crimes by their fellow Republican Matt Gaetz.
So much for the public’s right to know. So much for character. So much for holding public officials accountable. So much for standing up for traditional Iowa values.
Once again, blind, obvious partisanship prevails.
Iowa deserves so much better from its congressional delegation.
PASSINGS: My condolences to the family and friends of former U.S. Rep. Jim Leach of Iowa who passed away on December 11. He served Iowans in Congress for 30 years, 1977 -2007. He was a man of integrity, thoughtfulness and dedication to public service. There was not a moment that I did not admire and respect him, especially in his later years when he called out his own political party leaders who were taking the party into the weeds of extremism. A nearly life-long Republican, he eventually left his party in 2022 and became a Democrat.
Iowa was stronger - and a better - place when it had Republicans like Jim Leach. At the end, he was, sadly, a rapidly vanishing kind among Iowa Republicans.
Rest in Peace, sir.
Yep. The House investigated Hunter Biden, a private citizen, endlessly and never found his bad behavior influencing President Biden. But the investigation of Matt Gaetz, a congressman, was held behind closed doors, probably never to be revealed.
All four Iowa US Congress members are profiles in cowardice, terrified of being primaried.
Thanks, Barry. Well said. Our representatives in Congress represent no one but themselves. Their cowardice is discouraging, but predictable in the MAGA time we live in. It makes the loss of Jim Leach and his like, ever more poignant.