House Speaker Johnson says he will request Ethics Committee not release Gaetz report

House Speaker Mike Johnson said he does not think the House Ethics Committee report on allegations related to former Rep. Matt Gaetz — President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general — should be released, and he is “going to request that the Ethics Committee not release the report.”

“I do not. No, I think it’s a terrible breach of protocol,” he said when asked by reporters if the thinks the report should come out.

He said he planned to talk to House Ethics Committee Chairman Michael Guest about the situation.

“I will talk to him and anybody else. I’m going to try to reach him. I’ve been a bit busy,” he said, noting he got back from Mar-a-Lago late last night.

Asked if he would respect the panel’s decision if the committee chose to share the report with the Senate Judiciary Committee, Johnson replied, “I’m going to request that the Ethics Committee not release the report.”

“That is not the way we do things in the House, and I think that would be a terrible precedent,” he said.

Pressed on if the public had the right to know about the allegations now that President-elect Donald Trump has picked Gaetz to be attorney general, Johnson responded, “the rules of the House have always been that a former member is beyond the jurisdiction of the Ethics Committee, and so I don’t think that’s relevant.”

Gaetz resigned his seat in the House when Trump announced that he was going to nominate him to be attorney general.