The House Freedom Caucus has been trying to get Del. Stacey Plaskett’s newly revealed ties with Jeffrey Epstein failed to materialize Tuesday night after several Republicans joined Democrats in shutting it down.
After text messages surfacing showing that she had exchanged notes during Michael Cohen’s testimony in February 2019, the measure was intended to censure Plaskett and remove her from House Intelligence Committee.
Six Republicans who sided with leftists or voted for “present” threw the effort into disarray.
Reps. Lance Gooden from Texas, Don Bacon from Nebraska and Dave Joyce from Ohio, crossed over to the other side of the aisle in order to stop the censure. Three other GOP members voted in favor of the censure, including House Homeland Security Chair Andrew Garbarino from New York and Reps. Dan Meuser from Pennsylvania and Jay Obernolte from California.
Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.), who wrote the Resolution, said that “the House has a responsibility to protect this institution” and that “the documents in Epstein’s Estate are nothing short of alarming”. He added that they show that Plaskett coordinated her questioning at an Oversight – an official Oversight Hearing – with a former sex offenders, one whose crimes committed against minors stunned this nation.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) led Democrats in defending the action, calling it “another pathetic attempt to divert and distract attention from the facts that the President’s name appears more than 1,000 times in the tiny fraction of Epstein’s material.” Raskin called Epstein “Plaskett’s constituent,” pointing out the financier pedophile’s Virgin Islands residence.
Epstein’s text shows that he is interested in Plaskett grilling Cohen. Cohen used the hearings of 2019 to accuse Donald Trump, Jr. of orchestrating the hush money payments during the 2016 election. Plaskett responded, “Yup.” Epstein had written, at one point: “Hes has opened up the question of who the other henchmen are in the Trump org.” I am very aware of the situation and am waiting for my turn.
Republicans claim that the message exposes a double standard. Democrats demand full transparency regarding any Trump-Epstein connections, while remaining silent about Plaskett’s interactions with this disgraced financer. Plaskett and Trump have not been charged with any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein.
Raskin said that the GOP had abandoned basic fairness. They want to charge her with some crimes based solely on an article in a newspaper, even though it was ill-advised. He said, “She took a call from one her constituents.” Where is the transgression in ethics? What is the transgression of law? “Are you saying that anyone on your side who spoke to Jeffrey Epstein by phone should be censured?”
Plaskett’s messages first appeared in reports by the media after being discovered amongst documents provided to House Oversight Committee by Epstein’s estate.
