Tucker: Matt Gaetz sexual allegation interview 'one of weirdest' he's done

The Hill ^ | 03/31/21 07:51 AM EDT | BY THOMAS MOORE

[RandFan]

Tucker Carlson on Tuesday called his interview of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) one of the oddest in his career after inviting the congressman on his show to discuss an investigation he is facing for an alleged sexual relationship with a 17-year-old.

“If you just saw our Matt Gaetz interview, that was one of the weirdest interviews I have ever conducted,” Carlson said to his viewers after the segment on his Fox News show “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”

On Tuesday news broke that the Department of Justice was investigating whether Gaetz “had a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old and paid for her to travel with him,” three sources briefed on the probe told The New York Times.

Gaetz, in an Axios story later that day, denied the allegations but confirmed that he was under investigation.

Gaetz said that the accusations were part of an “extortion effort against my family for $25 million ... in exchange for making this case go away.”

He repeated those allegations on Carlson’s show.

“I know that there was a demand for money in exchange for a commitment that he could make this investigation go away along with his co-conspirators,” Gaetz told Carlson.

“They even claimed to have specific connections inside the Biden White House,” he added. “Now, I don’t know if that’s true. They were promising that Joe Biden would pardon me. Obviously, I don’t need a pardon. I’m not seeking a pardon. I have not done anything improper or wrong.”

Gaetz suggested the extortion plot could be tied to attempts to damage him politically, pointing to the fact that after news of the investigation broke, Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) asked that Gaetz be suspended from the House Judiciary Committee.

“But what I am troubled by is the real motivation for all of this,” Gaetz said to Carlson. “You know, just tonight, Ted Lieu, a Democrat, was calling on me to be removed from the House Judiciary Committee. I believe we are in an era of our politics now, Tucker, where people are smeared to try to take them out of the conversation.”

Gaetz told Carlson there have been similar attempts to use law enforcement to intimidate him, something he said the host should be aware of since it came up while Carlson and Gaetz were at dinner together once.

“I can say that actually, you and I went to dinner about two years ago, your wife was there, and I brought a friend of mine, you will remember her,” Gaetz said. “And she was actually threatened by the FBI, told that if she wouldn’t cop to the fact that somehow I was involved in some pay-for-play scheme that she could face trouble. And so I do believe that there are people at the Department of Justice who are trying to smear me.”

Carlson said he had no recollection of that event.

“I don’t remember the woman you are speaking of or the context at all, honestly,” Carlson said.

It was clear, after the segment ended, that Carlson was nonplussed by the interview he had just conducted.

“That story just appeared in the news a couple of hours ago, and on the certainty that there is always more than you read in the newspaper, we immediately called Matt Gaetz and asked him to come on and tell us more, which, as you saw, he did,” Carlson said about the interview. “I don’t think that clarified much, but it certainly showed this is a deeply interesting story, and we will be following it. Don’t quite understand it, but we will bring you more when we find out.”

Gaetz’s public statements about extortion on Carlson’s show and elsewhere may only make things worse for him, said one of the New York Times reporters who broke the story.

“You would think that he would be wanting to work with the FBI and you would think he would want to keep this quiet,” Katie Benner, who covers the Justice Department for the Times, said in an appearance on “The Rachel Maddow Show.”

“So you have to put this all into context and say that in doing this and basically blowing up an FBI investigation into people trying to extort his family, you know, he has both complicated that investigation and also cast aspersions on something that was serious enough that Attorney General [William] Barr approved it," Benner added.

[MercyFlush]

That’s a very broad assumption given that one of our Freepers Meganc married a much older man at 18. It’s safe to assume they were dating before that and she can correct me if I’m wrong.

[Fiji Hill]

Just curious. Why do folks rely on any third party source (Fox, Newsmax, etc) to keep them informed? Why do folks have a ‘favorite’ news channel?

What are your sources for keeping informed?

[maro]

NR is very Catholic. TWS is more secular. Founded by Bill Kristol, as I recall.

[Stingray51]

I did watch the Tucker interview just now. I do think Gaetz was pretty convincing and that Tucker calling the interview “weird” was itself more weird than anything Gaetz said. Still, I think Gaetz would have been better served by saying ‘while I was single, I had a girlfriend who was 22 and that was the youngest woman I had anything to do with...” Or something like that. Not saying something along those lines leaves the viewer wondering.

[Bishop_Malachi]

But consensual sex in not illegal.

________________________________________________

It is if it’s an adult with a minor. Now I know that 18 is an “arbitrary age”, but laws liek this are here to protect minors. It has to be drawn somewhere.

Western Society is already over-sexualized to absurd degrees. And it does not matter if “he didn’t know she was under 18. He’s not some 20 year old meeting her at college frat party. He’s quite a bit older. If he did have sexual relations with a minor, then he really has no defense. And that would be a shame. He has been a staunch defender of our policies.

[kiryandil]

“You would think that he would be wanting to work with the FBI and you would think he would want to keep this quiet,” Katie Benner, who covers the Justice Department for the Times, said in an appearance on “The Rachel Maddow Show.”

Just trust Democrat newspuppet Katie Benner - she would never lie for her political puppetmasters...

[kiryandil]

Concern troll Katie Benner, who represents the NY Times Council of Concern Trolls, is REALLY REALLY concerned.

[Forward the Light Brigade]

I need to know more. Lets see a picture of the Girl. What does she look like? The whole story please not just the age thing. At least she isn’t a Chinese Spy or a Russian. I bet such things re not normal—but I fear they are right. Epstein made millions from it.

[kiryandil]

Ted Lieu is a CCP puppet.

[petitfour]

My father was 20 years older than my mother. My favorite professor was 17 years older than his second wife. They were devoted to one another. She’s still in mourning, and he’s been gone over five years. She was 16 when she saw him for the first time and decided he was the man she was going to marry. Lovely story.

[MeganC]

I met my husband after I was 18 and we married a few months later. He was 44 at the time and is 56 now. It has worked well for us and he is everything I could have asked for in a husband!

Megan

[ready2brd]

Romeo and Juliet laws help protect adults that are no more than 4 years older than the consenting minor. Gaetz being 21 years older is staring at felony statutory rape.

[ready2brd]

If you think felony statutory rape is “benign”, then what isn’t acceptable?

Age of consent in FL is 18. Period. Gaetz knew this, and if the FBI can prove to a jury that he is guilty, he has hell to pay.

[Lazamataz]

I’m watching the interview. So far, Gaetz is looking strong. He stumbled a little at the 5+ minute mark, but overall he’s been very strong.

Why everyone on the left is calling this a ‘disaster interview’, would normally be beyond me... except now I understand they are trying to create a narrative.

[Mr Rogers]

“I would be tempted to shoot any SOB who slept with my teenage daughter”

MY daughters wouldn’t have gone out with a guy and slept with him.

[Golden Eagle]

As I recall, Tucker began his career as a writer for National Review.

Tucker’s true beginnings were at the Central Intelligence Agency. Some wonder if he ever actually left.

[Candor7]

Concern troll Katie Benner, who represents the NY Times Council of Concern Trolls, is REALLY REALLY concerned.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Katie Benner likely wants to be sex trafficked but there are no takers.

She is just so ugly that Matt did not pick her up for trade.

She just also likely wants to lash out for all these hate crimes against Asians, and Matt is her whipping post.

White Lives don't matter, you see, especially if they are elected Republican Congressmen. Don't you be electing any more of those White Supremacists to Congress.

She is an Alinskyite scion of Joseph Goebbels great fascist propaganda machine.

Katie Benner is as batty as they come, But curiously acts like a spy, purposefully obscure , and likely a Commie Chinese sleeper agent trying to take Matt out because he is after Swallwel ..

"Benner grew up in Vermont and was an English major at Bowdoin College in Maine.[1] After graduating in 1999 with "zero idea" about a career plan, she moved to Beijing to teach English.[2] While there, she wrote freelance about everything from monks to music[3] for the Beijing Review.[1] After 9/11, she began collecting information about how the attack had affected American expatriates. A friend told her this would make an interesting news story. She pitched the idea to the Portland Press Herald in Maine, where she had some contacts, having worked in a deli during college and regularly made sandwiches for several of the newspaper's writers and editors. The newspaper accepted her stories, launching her U.S. journalistic career"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katie_Benner

Also:

"Katie, who embraces Asian ethnicity, was a teacher back in China nearly two decades ago. Alongside teaching, she also used to work as a copy editor for a few Chinese newspapers."

https://marrieddivorce.com/tv-celebrity/katie-benner-bio-parents-husband.html

She has Chicom sleeper agent written all over her sorry ass.

[MercyFlush]

Congratulations and many more happy years to you both!

[Golden Eagle]

I don’t trust Carlson, or Fox. Illusion of opposition. It’s Controlled Opposition. Gaetz is being targeted because he IS ACTUAL OPPOSITION.

Well stated. I believe Gates can handle Tucker and FOX. A corrupt DOJ attempting to frame him will be a tougher challenge though. He needs and deserves our support.

[napscoordinator]

Lovely story? 16 is pedophile behavior. NAMDA or whatever it’s called has nothing on some of you. I can see it now liberals and conservatives joining that group.