The far-right Florida Republican Matt Gaetz forced Kevin McCarthy out as House speaker last year “because he slept with a 17-year-old” and wanted a congressional ethics investigation to end, McCarthy charged on Tuesday.
“I’ll give you the truth why I’m not speaker,” McCarthy said, at an event at Georgetown University in Washington.
The House ethics investigation of allegations against Gaetz opened in 2021, when Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, was speaker.
The Beast said “other Republican congressional sources” also said Gaetz was motivated to move against McCarthy by the ethics investigation, not policy differences.
Gaetz told the Beast: “As I’ve answered likely 100 times on the record, I led the charge to remove Kevin McCarthy from his role as House speaker because he failed to keep his promises.”.
McCarthy lost his job shortly after relying on Democratic support to pass a spending package, thereby averting a government shutdown.
At Georgetown, McCarthy said: “So then they come out and they say [I was ejected] because I kept government open. »
