House Ethics Committee Ranking Member: No Agreement to Release Report on Gaetz, Committee Will Reconvene on December 5

TAPPER: “Kristen, I’m so sorry, I have to go interrupt you. We’re going to go back to Capitol Hill. Congresswoman Wild speaking there. She’s a member of the House Ethics Committee.”

WILD: “I walked out of this committee without making one and walked back to my office, but it has since come to my attention that, in fact, we had agreed that we were not going to discuss what had transpired at the meeting, but it has come to my attention that the chairman has since betrayed the process by disclosing our deliberations within moments after walking out of the committee. And he has implied that there was an agreement of the committee not to disclose the report. That is an untrue — to the extent that that suggests that the committee was in agreement or that we had a consensus on that, that is inaccurate. And I will say that a vote was taken. As many of you know, this committee is evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans. Five Dems, Five Republicans. Which means that in order to affirmatively move something forward, somebody has to cross party lines and vote with the other side, which happens a lot by the way, and we often vote unanimously. That did not happen in today’s vote, and I do not want the American public or anyone else to think that Mr. Guest’s characterization of what transpired today would be some sort of indication that the committee had unanimity or consensus on this issue not to release the report. That would be an inaccurate portrayal and nobody should take that from what they have heard so far. There was no consensus on this issue. We did agree that we would reconvene as a committee on December 5th to further consider this matter. And this statement that I have just made is on behalf of all of the Democratic members of the Ethics Committee. Thank you.

RAJU: “Did all the Democrats vote yes? Did all the vote — Democrats vote —“

Reporter: “What happens between now and December 5th? Is there work that still has to be done on the report?”

WILD: “That was part of our discussions today and there will — I’m not going to get into our discussions because I don’t believe that we should be disclosing anything that happens in that committee room, and I would not be even commenting to this extent except that the chairman has essentially suggested that there was agreement of the members of the committee, which there most definitely was not.”

RAJU: “The chairman also said that the report is not done. The chairman also said the report is not done. Is the report done?”

Reporter 2: “Is that accurate?”

WILD: “I haven’t seen him say that. I haven’t seen that statement and I really don’t care to comment on the status of the report except to say that we were in a position to vote today. That’s all I’ll say.”

Reporter 3: “Would you release the report even if the Republicans object?”