Raise your hand if you’ve been accused of sex trafficking and voted — repeatedly — against a law protecting sex trafficking victims.
That’s right — who else but GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida?
Gaetz, currently under investigation over an allegation he had sex with a minor he paid to travel across state lines with him, on Tuesday voted with 19 other Republicans against reauthorizing a law that funds support services for victims of sex trafficking. (Gaetz has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing.)
The House ultimately passed the bill to reauthorize the law, known as the Frederick Douglass Trafficking Victims Prevention and Protection Reauthorization Act of 2022, in a 401-20 vote.
It wasn’t a great look for Gaetz, who voted against a similar bill protecting sex trafficking victims in 2017. And the fact multiple Trump White House officials testified to the House Jan. 6 committee that Gaetz sought a blanket pardon from Trump as his presidency was coming to an end only adds to the rightful suspicions people have about Gaetz’s behavior.
That said, he’s not the only Republican who voted against the anti-sex trafficking bill. And he’s not the only one who should feel gross about it. The 19 House Republicans who joined him include several people — like Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado — who have baselessly slurred liberals as “groomers” simply for supporting LGBTQ-inclusive school curricula. But their stance here is undeniably aligned with the interests of real groomers. Sex trafficking predators would almost certainly side with these Republicans’ opposition to the bill.
It’s a noteworthy union that finds members of the ostensibly “anti-groomer” party siding with literal groomers. Strange bedfellows, indeed.
Ja’han Jones is an MS NOW opinion blogger. He previously wrote The ReidOut Blog.