Two women have filed a lawsuit accusing former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Florida, of participating in a sex trafficking scheme between 2017 and 2019.
The women, who are identified in the civil complaint filed Oct. 15 as Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2, allege Gaetz and two coconspirators coerced the young women into sex trafficking and supplied them with drugs, trips and money.
Gaetz denied the new allegations in a statement to USA TODAY, saying in an email, "I look forward to taking the plaintiffs’ depositions because much of the conduct alleged against me is false. The lawsuit relies almost exclusively on a Congressional Committee Report that didn’t allow me to confront my accusers. Now I will finally have that chance."
The 38-page lawsuit is the latest chapter
in a scandal that erupted just as President Donald Trump nominated Gaetz to be his attorney general in 2024.
In November 2024, Gaetz stepped down from Congress after the then-president elect tapped him for the role. Just a week later, Gaetz withdrew his nomination after a lawyer said two women told the House Ethics Committee that Gaetz paid them for sex. He was never criminally charged.
The lawsuit largely follows the contours of the House Ethics Committee complaint.
The women allege Gaetz paid victims with drugs, and Jane Doe 1 said she witnessed Gaetz having sex with a girl who was, at the time, 17 years old, according to the complaint. Gaetz has repeatedly denied ever engaging in sexual exchanges with a minor. The alleged exploitation occurred during trips to Miami, Las Vegas, the Florida Keys, the Bahamas and New York City and at parties in Florida, the lawsuit says.
"At the time of this venture, GAETZ was a sitting member of Congress, holding himself out to be one of President Donald J. Trump's closest confidants and most loyal supports," according to the new complaint.
"Every part of this venture ran on an exploitative power imbalance. On one side stood a sitting congressman, an elected tax collector, and a former state legislator, men with public office, private homes and money," the complaint continues. "On the other stood young financially vulnerable women in their early twenties. The venture assumed that women with so little would never be believed over men with so much."
The other two men named in the suit are former Seminole County Tax Collector Joel Greenberg – who in 2021 pleaded guilty for sex trafficking, among other federal offenses – and former Florida state Rep. Christopher Dorworth.
Dorworth previously sued Greenberg, alleging that he, his family and their business entities falsely implicated Dorworth in Greenberg's crimes. The new complaint says that Dorworth's "alleged participation is limited to the separately pleaded conduct at his residence" and an agreement of recruitment, payment and control, but not sexual acts.
Neither Dorworth nor Greenberg responded to USA TODAY's request for comment before publication.
The unnamed women in the new case are identified as 15 and 13 years younger than Gaetz, who turned 35 in 2017. In the complaint, they allege that Greenberg found them in the Florida Driver and Vehicle Information Database, which he previously admitted he was able to access as a tax collector in the state.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Women sue former Rep. Matt Gaetz, alleging sex trafficking
