Gaetz came on Tucker Carlson and attempted to get in front of the allegations, and claimed that a specific DOJ employee had been attempting to extort him. And implied that the DOJ and FBI may have leaked the investigation to the NYT in order to bury the investigation.
Relatively quickly, team Blue reacted by trying to embarrass him in regards to the interview:
Imma press X to doubt on that.
That was my first reaction as well when I heard this.
"If it turns out he is guilty, then throw the book at him......but forgive me for not trusting you. So I am going to put a pin in this accusation and come back to it later ANNNNDDD You were lying to me."
What's interesting is that the lie has gotten crazier since the day started. So far, I've heard them say he's being investigated for:
They're panicking and throwing shit at the wall.
LOOK HE'S JUST GUILTY NOW STOP ASKING ABOUT THE DOJ EMPLOYEES! NO FORMER GOVERNMENT OFFICIAL HAS TIES TO THEIR AGENCIES! NO ONE! HE HAS TO BE OFF ALL OF THE COMITEES! HE SUPPORTS TRUMP! SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP! IT'S ALL CONFUSION! DON'T BE CONFUSED AND JUST BELIEVE WHAT I'M SAYING! YOU SEE THIS TAX COLLECTOR? WELL HE'S LIKE GATEZ AND HE'S GUILTY SO GATEZ IS GUILTY!
Remember that Gaetz says this alleged 17 year old does not even exist.
It's a bold move, but honestly, it's a ballsy move that might be working. Gaetz basically went to fucking war on Tucker's show last night, and I don't think anyone was ready for it. If he's lying, then he's committing a very serious case of defamation. Not just "he'll lose his political career", it's a level of "he'll lose his fucking home and all of his wealth for the serious felonious allegations he's pointing at a fucking attorney at law". If he's not, oh boy is shit gonna have to hit the fan. Disbarment, fraud, corruption, manufactured evidence, allegations involving the Presidency.
Oh, if this is all fake and an attempt at extortion (seems likely unless we get some DAMN good counter-evidence), I guarantee they were hoping that he would roll over and beg for mercy, and the last thing they expected was for him to go Full Retard and go on the offensive against THEM. So now they are forced to throw increasingly extreme accusations at him hoping it makes him back off.
And if that was their plan, I have to ask: Did they think Trump and the Populist were joking when they said they were there to kick ass and ruin establishments, and they're all out of ass?
In their defense, nobody in their circles does this.
He was going to take the hit no matter what happened. That's why the idea that you would try to extort a conservative by saying you would go to the press with the extortion claim is absurd to us. Don Lemon would rape your dog on live TV if the thought it could hurt your poll numbers. Why on God's Green Earth would anyone believe that the Antifa supporting communists of twitter Trots and racist lynchers would not try to defame any Republican given an opportunity.
Jesus, look how they treat John McCain and Mitt Romney who are effectively on their side at this point. They exist only to be used to claim their positions have mass bi-partisan support, and then are run over with a truck.
Even if Gaetz paid 25 million dollars in gold bullion to the person who contacted him, the Washington Post would say that claiming Matt Gaetz didn't rape a 12 year old girl was a baseless conspiracy theory. There is no upside to this deal.
But Washington politicians are so fundamentally cowardly that they are not prepared to take any hits in order to gain victories. Someone else has to get hurt for them. Gaetz knew that asking for mercy from Leftist media would be both stupid and self-defeating. Also, 'granting a pardon' means still getting a conviction. So, he took the hit to the face, got in front of the story, and (for a moment) re-took the initiative.
He should not be waiting for the FBI to release their recordings though.
Part of the problem here is that I'd bet money that it was the FBI agents he was working with that leaked the story of the investigation. You think FBI and DOJ employees wouldn't work together to try and destroy a populist politician? Hell, it wouldn't surprise me if we found out that the former DOJ employee that asked for the $25 million was an FBI informant, and this was a ruse to get Gaetz dad (and maybe himself) put in prison by having Don Gaetz give money to an FBI informant at the behest of the FBI.
As if the FBI hasn't engaged in entrapment before.