Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) accused Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) of openly detailing his sexual experiences to fellow lawmakers in a bonkers interview with CNN on Wednesday. (You can check out his comments in the clip below.)
“He bragged about how he would crush E.D. medicine and chase it with energy drinks so he could go all night. This is obviously before he got married,” Mullin told CNN’s Manu Raju.
Mullin, an ally of former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), made the wild claims about Gaetz after the Florida Republican ― and seven other members of his party ― joined all House Democrats in supporting the ouster of McCarthy from his post on Tuesday.
The move arrived after Gaetz filed a motion to vacate the California Republican from the speaker’s chair.
Gaetz, in a statement to CNN, dismissed Mullin’s accusations.
“I don’t think Markwayne Mullin and I have said 20 words to each other on the House floor,” Gaetz said.
“This is a lie from someone who doesn’t know me and who is coping with the death of the political career of his friend Kevin. Thoughts and prayers.”
Earlier in the interview, the senator referred to allegations from 2021 that Gaetz had sex with a 17-year-old girl ― adding that the media didn’t pay the Florida Republican any mind because of the accusations.
The Justice Department dropped sex trafficking charges against Gaetz in February after investigating him over the allegations since 2020. Gaetz has denied the allegations.
“There’s a reason why no one in the conference came and defended him ― because we had all seen the videos he was showing on the House floor that all of us had walked away, of the girls he had slept with,” Mullin said.
Mullin’s claims arrive on the same day Marc Short, chief of staff for former Vice President Mike Pence, said Gaetz more likely came to Washington “for the teenage interns on Capitol Hill” than to be a “fiscal crusader.”
The senator claimed that no one in the media gave Gaetz the “time of day” until November last year, when “all of a sudden he found fame” when he opposed the prospects of a McCarthy speakership.
“And he’s always stayed there,” Mullin said. “And he was never gonna leave until he got this last moment of fame by saying ― by going after a motion to vacate.”