Rolling Stone - USA (2020-03)

JE

MA

L^ C

OU

NT

ES

S/

RE

DU

X

40 | Rolling Stone | March 2020

The MAGA Mouthpiece

M

ATT GAETZ DOESN’T WANT to

shake my hand when I walk into

his office. Considering what he

is doing, I’m glad he doesn’t. “I

don’t want to get concealer on you,” he ex-

plains, turning away from his mirror to greet

me. “I promise I’m not doing this for effect

for your interview.” A MAC Cosmetics case sits

open on a nearby table. He turns back to the

mirror and resumes dabbing his face. “Go right

ahead with your questions,” he says.

Gaetz, a 37-year-old Republican congress-

man from Florida, is in a rush. It’s mid-January

and a House procedural vote related to Presi-

dent Trump’s impeachment had run long. Now

he’s due in a neighboring House office building

for a Fox Business appearance. Before the vote,

he’d done a hit for Fox News Radio and anoth-

er for War Room, a podcast hosted by former

Trump guru Steve Bannon, former Trump cam-

paign staffer Jason Miller, and former Breitbart

London editor Raheem Kassam. That evening,

he’ll head to a studio to appear live on Hanni-

ty, the premier platform for any Trump-loving

lawmaker. Gaetz is a regular guest.

Outside of maybe President Trump, there

isn’t a politician in Washington who exerts as

much care over his media presence as Gaetz,

who since 2017 has represented Florida’s ultra-

conservative 1st District, a swath of Panhandle

known for its large military presence. He plas-

ters his face across Fox News; he feuds with his

enemies on Twitter; he orchestrates controver-

sial publicity stunts like inviting Holocaust de-

nier Charles Johnson to the State of the Union

in 2018 (Gaetz later claimed he didn’t know

about Johnson’s anti-Semitism), or introduces

dead-in-the-water legislation to disband the En-

vironmental Protection Agency. Following this

year’s State of the Union, he announced plans

to file a bogus ethics complaint against House

Speaker Nancy Pelosi for ripping up a copy of

Trump’s speech.

The result has been headlines, which are

worth their weight in committee assignments in

the reality-TV fun house Trump has fashioned

out of Washington. Gaetz can’t seem to go more

than a week or two without manufacturing a

clickbait-ready piece of chum to throw to the

press, which has largely obliged him.

“Look, after 10 months I figured out that you

only really matter if you can move substantial

sums of money, or substantial blocs of votes,”

PARTY LINE

“It’s almost

a function

of growing up

in a powerful

political

family,” one

Gaetz friend

says. “He’s not

used to his

voice not

mattering.”

On the Hill with Florida

Rep. Matt Gaetz, Trump’s

most shameless loyalist

By RYAN BORT