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In August federal prosecutors accused Stephen Alford of trying to defraud US Rep. Matt Gaetz’s father Don Gaetz out of $25 million. And last week Stephen Alford, 62, pleaded guilty in an attempt to extort $25 million from Matt Gaetz’s father. According to The Washington Examiner, the announcement by the Justice Department marks a turnaround as Alford initially entered a not guilty plea. A charge of tampering with evidence was tossed, according to Northwest Florida Daily News .

Rep. Matt Gaetz possesses text message screenshots, an email, and a typed document that purportedly support his claims that a federal investigation into his relationship with a 17-year-old is related to an extortion scheme against him. On Tuesday, the New York Times reported that the Justice Department is investing whether Gaetz had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid her to travel with him. Gaetz has called the report "totally false." Gaetz told Axios that his lawyers told him that he "was not a target but a subject of an investigation regarding sexual conduct with women." The Florida Republican...

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) reportedly bragged to people involved in Florida politics that he had met women through a county tax collector who has since been hit with federal sex trafficking charges. Two people who heard his comments directly told The Washington Post that Gaetz had also showed them videos of nude women on his phone. Some of the videos were from parties with former Seminole County tax collector Joel Greenberg. The sources said the women in the videos appeared to be adults. “Matt was never shy about talking about his relationship to Joel and the access to women that...

A defiant Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) says he has no plans to resign from Congress amid a federal investigation into whether he paid women — and a 17-year-old girl — for sexual favors. Yet behind the scenes, a growing number of Gaetz’s Republican colleagues are predicting his days on Capitol Hill are growing short. “In reality, yes, he won’t last long,” one member told The Hill on Friday. The forecasts seem to be based on some combination of political pragmatism and wishful thinking. Gaetz, who stands among the fiercest defenders of former President Trump, is no stranger to controversy, but...

An alleged orgy with prostitutes. Accusations of sex with an underage girl. A trophy photo of a woman wearing only a hula hoop. And a convoluted extortion plot involving a likely dead American hostage in Iran. Even by Florida standards, the Matt Gaetz saga is downright bizarre — and getting weirder by the day. Before this week, the young Sunshine State congressman and ally of former President Donald Trump was best known, like his mentor, for his ambitious conservatism and promontory coiffure. But this week, the Republican has faced a daily flurry of scandalous ­headlines. Most seriously, he is being...

The material suggests that Gaetz’s father was told his son’s legal problems could go away if he gave $25 million to help secure the release of Iranian hostage Bob Levinson. --- The scandal swirling around Rep. Matt Gaetz took a stunning turn Wednesday with the news that a former Air Force intelligence official and a Florida lawyer tried to get the congressman’s dad to cough up $25 million that would be used to free American Bob Levinson from Iranian custody—and somehow release Gaetz from a federal sex-crimes investigation. And if that wasn’t enough, here’s one more strange fact: Levinson was...

I predicted this. I just heard on the Radio, GOP Leader McCarthy says he’s ready to Oust Gaetz and remove him from Committee’s, if allegations are True. Wow, That didn’t take long. (Married) Swalwell’s Mistress and Chinese Spy talked him into running for President - and he’s on the Intelligence Committee.

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. — Rep. Matt Gaetz’s father, Don, a former Florida Senate president, said he is working with the FBI, including wearing a wire on more than one occasion as part of an investigation into an alleged extortion plot that the pair said was organized by former federal prosecutor David McGee. “The FBI asked me to try and get that information for Matt and an indication we would transfer money to Mr. David McGee,” Don Gaetz said in an interview late Tuesday, without specifying what information he was referring to. McGee, who is now in private practice with a Pensacola,...

Congressman Matt Gaetz claimed that, as part of an FBI sting, his father was sup­posed to con­tact this for­mer DOJ employ­ee on Wednes­day to arrange a down­pay­ment of $4.5 mil­lion on the $25 mil­lion extor­tion. The U.S. Attorney’s Offices for North­ern and Cen­tral Flori­da declined to comment.“I don’t think it’s a coin­ci­dence that tonight some­how The New York Times is leak­ing this infor­ma­tion, smear­ing me and ruin­ing the inves­ti­ga­tion that would like­ly result in a one of the for­mer col­leagues of the cur­rent DOJ being brought to jus­tice,” Gaetz said.Gaetz told Fox that the for­mer DOJ employ­ee going after him...

Earlier today, the Wall Street Journal reported about how the US Justice Department has been investigating whether Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old girl and paid her to travel with him, people familiar with the matter said. Investigators are examining whether Mr. Gaetz, a close ally of former President Donald Trump, violated federal sex-trafficking laws, the people said. Those laws make it illegal to transport someone younger than 18 across state lines to engage in sex. The investigation, first reported by the New York Times, began last year when Mr. Trump was president,...

SNIP The lawmaker told The Times he suspects somebody is trying to extort him and his family for $25 million. “I have a suspicion that someone is trying to recategorize my generosity to ex-girlfriends as something more untoward,” he told the newspaper. He added in a series of tweets Tuesday night that he and his family have been working with the feds in an investigation that involves a former DOJ official seeking to extort him. “My father has even been wearing a wire at the FBI’s direction to catch these criminals. The planted leak to the FBI tonight was intended...

Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) defended himself after news broke on Tuesday of a Department of Justice (DOJ) probe reportedly investigating whether the lawmaker had sexual relations with a teenager, claiming he was the victim of “an organized criminal extortion” involving a former DOJ official. “Over the past several weeks my family and I have been victims of an organized criminal extortion involving a former DOJ official seeking $25 million while threatening to smear my name,” Gaetz said in a series of tweets on Tuesday. “We have been cooperating with federal authorities in this matter and my father has even been...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - A former FBI agent is being held by Iranian authorities, the Financial Times reported on Friday, but U.S. officials said they were still unable to verify the whereabouts of the missing American. Florida resident and ex-FBI agent Robert Levinson went missing while on a visit to the Gulf island of Kish in Iran early in March. His family has not heard from him since and U.S. officials told Reuters they do not have any valid leads. Diplomats fear the case of Levinson could mark a new twist in apparent tit-for-tat detentions involving the United States, Britain and...

Robyn Gritz spent 16 years at the FBI, where she investigated a series of major national security threats. But she says she got crosswise with her supervisors, who pushed her out and yanked her security clearance. For the first time, she's speaking out about her situation, warning about how the bureau treats women and the effects of a decade of fighting terrorism. --SNIP-- Retired Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who led the Defense Intelligence Agency, worked closely with Gritz to find terrorists overseas. He says it's a shame the FBI let go of someone with years of top national security experience.

Missing American Feared a Victim of 'Dirty War' April 13, 2007 The Financial Times Guy Dinmore in Washington and Najmeh Bozorgmehr in Tehran Just why Robert Levinson, a former Federal Bureau of Investigation agent and now private investigator, should venture into Iran to meet a American fugitive wanted for murder in the US remains a mystery that the highest Bush administration authorities are trying to unravel. As the Financial Times revealed this week, Mr Levinson disappeared on March 8 after a six-hour meeting on the Iranian island of Kish with Dawud Salahuddin, an American who converted to Islam and was...

Hours after the New York Times broke a story on the Justice Department investigating sex trafficking allegations against Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fl.), Gaetz appeared on Fox News’ Tucker to refute the claims.Asked about the story by Tucker Carlos, Gaetz says “It is a horrible allegation, and it is a lie.”Gaetz reiterated claims made on Twitter and elsewhere that the allegations stem from a former Justice Department official who was attempting to blackmail him. That official, who Gaetz named as “David McGee,” contacted Gaetz’s father, according to the Republican House member.Gaetz says his family went to the local FBI in Florida,...

David McGee, an attorney with Beggs & Lane, is the man the Florida Republican named during an appearance Tuesday evening on Tucker Carlson's Fox News show in which he responded to reports that he is under federal investigation over a former relationship. McGee served for six years as the first assistant at the U.S. Attorney’s Office and for seven years as the lead attorney for a Justice Department's Organized Crime Task Force, according to his biography on the website of his law firm, which is based in Pensacola, Florida. (Cut) The New York Times reported Gaetz, 38, is being looked...

Over the past several weeks my family and I have been victims of an organized criminal extortion involving a former DOJ official seeking $25 million while threatening to smear my name.We have been cooperating with federal authorities in this matter...— Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) March 30, 2021...and my father has even been wearing a wire at the FBI’s direction to catch these criminals. The planted leak to the FBI tonight was intended to thwart that investigation.No part of the allegations against me are true, and the people pushing these lies are targets...— Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) March 30, 2021...of the ongoing extortion...

A record-breaking ruling for the family of Bob Levinson, a former FBI Agent who vanished while in Iran 13-years ago. Thursday, a U.S. judge ruled Iran must pay Levinson's family $1.46 billion, the largest judgement for a case of this kind... Levinson disappeared in 2007 while working as a CIA contractor in Iran. His family immediately called on (Atty. David) McGee, who was Levinson's friend, to help bring him home... Earlier this year, Levinson's family announced they were convinced the husband and father of seven was dead. In a statement, they said the judgement was the "the first step in...