Government

Gaetz PR Team Tries To Magic Away Sex Scandal By Threatening Journalists

Consummate professionals!

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(Photo by Samuel Corum/Getty Images)

“We are seeking an immediate print and on-air statement of retraction. Failure to comply with this request may result in litigation,” blustered pro-Trump pundit Erin Elmore in an email to Politico on behalf of her client Matt Gaetz.

Elmore, a former “Apprentice” contestant and fixture in the conservative demi-monde, is actually licensed to practice law in Pennsylvania. She has no excuse for not knowing the actual malice standard for reporting about a public figure. Nevertheless, in her capacity as a member of the PR team at Logan Circle Group, Elmore dispatched a similar nastygram to the Daily Beast, warning that a lawyer would be “closely monitoring your coverage” of the embattled congressman.

Both outlets promptly printed excerpts of her emails — once they quit laughing.

Apparently the salacious details about alleged paid sex with teenagers, one of whom may have been a minor at the time, isn’t the primary concern for the Logan Circle Group. These consummate professionals are most exercised about the suggestion that Gaetz is persona non grata in Trumpland these days.

Last Friday, the Daily Beast reported that the former president’s coterie had convinced him to keep quiet about Gaetz, in part because the alleged conduct did not seem at all out of character for the 38-year-old congressman.

“Operatives inside Trump World say the silence is owed to a variety of factors,” Politico reported Tuesday. “Among them is the fact that Gaetz has always been regarded as a grenade whose pin had already been pulled. The congressman had a reputation for a wild personal lifestyle that, associates say, occasionally bordered on reckless.”

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In an ironic twist for someone who has been accused of bombarding his colleagues with naked photos of his sexual conquests, the outlet reports that “Some of Gaetz’s own aides would regularly send embarrassing videos of their boss to other GOP operatives, according to two people familiar with the videos.”

“Anyone that has ever spent 10 minutes with the guy would realize he’s an unserious person,” a former Trump campaign aide told Politico.

On Wednesday, after the New York Times reported that Gaetz had solicited the White House for a blanket pardon during the final weeks of Trump’s presidency (i.e., when the investigation into his buddy Joel Greenberg was inching ever closer to him), the president finally issued a tepid statement of defense.

“Congressman Matt Gaetz has never asked me for a pardon,” he said in one of his fake Tweets. “It must also be remembered that he has totally denied the accusations against him.”

And Erin Elmore, who knows as much about linear time as she does the New York Times v. Sullivan standard, leapt into action. If something was true on Tuesday, and it is no longer true on Wednesday, then it means the story on Tuesday was defamatory and must be retracted. Check and mate!

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“President Trump issued a statement indicating that Congressman Gaetz has never sought a Presidential Pardon. Such a statement would also indicate that President Donald Trump has not distanced himself from Congressman Gaetz,” she wrote to Politico.

Spoiler Alert: Politico did not retract the story.

Meanwhile, after running his stupid mouth for a week, Rep. Gaetz appears to have finally grokked that he might be in a wee spot of deep shit. CNBC reports that he’s hired defense attorneys Marc Mukasey, who also represents Trump, and Isabelle Kirshner, a partner at New York’s Clayman & Rosenberg. Perhaps they’ll explain that yapping on television about your father wearing a wire for the FBI is not the move when you’re under federal investigation. And that the first rule of criminal investigations is OMG, SHUT THE HELL UP.

Which would put Gaetz’s very professional lawyers on a collision course with his somewhat less professional PR team. The Logan Circle jerks (sorry, not sorry) are led by Harlan Hill, whose main claim to fame appears to be his willingness to say absolutely any ridiculous, indiscrete thing in defense of Donald Trump.

Here he is threatening to go to Philadelphia and f*ck shit up to stop the vote counting.

Oh, no, protect Gritty!

Here’s Hill in happier days, before he got banned from Fox in November for calling Vice President-elect Kamala Harris an “insufferable lying bitch.”

Yeah, he looks like three toddlers in a trench coat. Maybe Mukasey and Kirshner can keep him from blowing up their legal strategy with a package of Fruit Roll-Ups.

Can’t wait to see how this brain trust spins those Venmo payments to the owner of OrlandoSugarDaddy dot com.

Gaetz-tied group threatens to sue reporters writing on his Trump relationship [Politico]
Gaetz Paid Accused Sex Trafficker, Who Then Venmo’d Teen [Daily Beast]

Elizabeth Dye lives in Baltimore where she writes about law and politics.

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