What Matt Gaetz could do as Trump’s Attorney General

Well, that’s called timing.

A meeting of the Ethics Committee of the US House of Representatives was actually scheduled for Friday. The ten-member, mixed-party committee wanted to vote to publish a potentially damning report on a certain Matt Gaetz. This Matt Gaetz, the representative for the first district of Florida (nice area, nice beaches), is said to have, among other things, slept with a 17-year-old and used drugs. We may never know what exactly is in the report, the publication of which the accused repeatedly successfully delayed.

Because two days before this at least unpleasant date, Donald Trump appointed Matt Gaetz as his Attorney General, Minister of Justice and Federal Prosecutor General in one person. The highlight of the matter: Because this is a full-time job, the 42-year-old resigned from his parliamentary position with immediate effect and with a light heart. This means that the ethics committee is no longer responsible for him and his alleged crimes. As if the allegations of corruption, embezzlement and human trafficking never existed. As if no one ever complained that Gaetz showed his colleagues nude photos of his “romantic” conquests.

Some say that we’re getting the hang of it, but others say we’re splitting hairs. House Speaker Mike Johnson claimed that Gaetz’s turbo-resignation merely wanted to give the party more time to fill a replacement. Now you don’t have to look far out of the window to get the unseemly idea: the man was transported to the rescue.

But one thing is also certain: Trump does not want to bring his protégé to the adult table out of purely fatherly care, but as an instrument of his revenge.

The attempt to place Matt Gaetz politically promises stiffness in the neck. Because to the right of him there is only the wall. Even when Gaetz laughs (often loudly and spitefully), he always has something of a comic villain about him thanks to his V-shaped eyebrows. Not inappropriate, as he has a penchant for conspiracy theories, pursues a strict anti-abortion policy, demonizes the billions in aid for Ukraine – everything an ambitious Republican needs to have in the Trump age.

The lawyer from Hollywood (not in LA, but at the southern tip of Florida) describes himself as an “outspoken conservative hothead.” Scheming is in his blood; his father Don represented the Sunshine State as a senator in Washington. To this day, Gaetz Junior has to put up with the nickname “Baby Gaetz” – hobby psychologists are likely to sit up and take notice.

The hot-headedness, which he sees as his strength, pushes his opponents to the limit. In 2018, he invited a Holocaust denier to Trump’s State of the Union address. He later made headlines when he hired a speechwriter who had himself spoken at a right-wing rally. His appearance with a gas mask during the corona pandemic will also be remembered. Not to be forgotten: Gaetz was the ringleader of the revolt in the House of Representatives last year, which ultimately cost Speaker Kevin McCarthy his career and a chunk of time for the entire government. And hanging over everything (at least until this week) was the accusation that he had had sex with a minor – even though the Justice Department concluded the investigation against his future boss in 2023 without charging him.

In the House of Representatives, people across party lines must have breathed a sigh of relief when the poltergeist with a penchant for tight suits and extravagant angry speeches announced his departure on Wednesday. Now his colleagues on the other side of the hallway have him on the cheek.

The Senate still has to confirm Gaetz’s appointment as Minister of Justice. The smaller of the two chambers of Congress will soon be firmly in Republican hands again. Party patriarch Trump should actually be able to wave his favorite through without any problems. But Gaetz is too loud, too over-the-top, too… right-wing, even for some right-wingers. A party colleague once called him a “Republican who runs with scissors.”

In addition, the newly elected new leader of the Republican senators, John Thune, has a hard MAGA shell for the sake of political survival, but a classic conservative core. A dying species, but still influential, at least in the Senate. These old-school Republicans despise new-right upstarts like Gaetz, seeing them as moral decay personified.

that Trump simply wants to test the loyalty of his vassals in the Senate by nominating Gaetz. He suggested Gaetz precisely because his appointment would be so absurd. Even if Klein is right: Trump needs a hybrid of attack dog and paragraph bender at the top of the ministry.

What fades into the background in view of the fear of mass deportations, trade wars and dictator cronyism: Trump not only wanted to go back to the White House to rule – but above all so that he didn’t spend the rest of his life behind bars.

As Attorney General, Gaetz would be responsible for overseeing all investigations by federal authorities – including those against his boss. Trump would order his minion to stop all federal investigations. Where there is no chief prosecutor, there is no judge. There is no question that Gaetz would obey. For Trump, loyalty always comes first. Whether competence makes it onto the podium is debatable.

Once Trump shakes off the annoying nightmare of orange jumpsuits, he could certainly entrust Gaetz with even more delicate matters. With “Project 2025,” for example, the ominous 920-page ultra-right battle plan with which Trump supposedly wants nothing to do, the ultra-conservative “pre-” thinkers dream of placing the entire executive branch directly under the president. A yes man at the top of the judiciary wouldn’t be a bad start.

But that is a thing of the future. Trump initially craves simpler pleasures, above all: revenge. Whether criminally sloppy handling of secret documents, incitement to election fraud or incitement to storm the Capitol – from his point of view, none of these are legitimate allegations, but all political harassment. Which doesn’t mean he won’t make use of it himself once he’s seated within the safe (four?) walls of the Oval Office. With a personal inquisitor at the head of the judiciary, Trump could hardly resist the temptation. It’s Payback Time: Time to reverse the “witch hunt.”