A slate of House Republican lawmakers is calling out their fellow colleagues over what they described as a “backroom deal” over competing censure resolutions.
The House rejected an effort on Tuesday to censure Democratic Virgin Islands Del. Stacey Plaskett and remove her from the House Intelligence Committee over allegations stemming from thousands of newly released documents that show a text exchange between her and late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein during a 2019 congressional hearing.
Democrats responded to the GOP-led measure by renewing their own censure resolution against Rep. Cory Mills (R-Fla.), who has faced accusations of domestic abuse, violating federal law and stolen valor, all of which he denies. It was ultimately killed after the effort against Plaskett failed in a 209-214 vote, most along party lines.
Three Republicans — Reps. Don Bacon of Nebraska, Lance Gooden of Texas and David Joyce of Ohio — voted with Democrats to drop the measure, and another three Republicans — Reps. Andrew Garbarino of New York, Dan Meuser of Pennsylvania and Jay Obernolte of California — voted “present.”
Several staunch GOP lawmakers are now accusing their party of cutting a deal with Democrats to avoid a rebuke of Mills.
Following the failed censure vote, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) claimed Democratic and Republican leaders were both “cutting back-end deals to cover up public corruption in the House of Representatives.”
“The Plaskett censure failed because house leadership exchanged that censure failure for the withdrawal of a vote to censure and refer Cory Mills to house ethics for investigation,” Luna wrote in a post on X. “The swamp protects itself.”
Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) said the unsuccessful vote reveals “how corrupt this place is,” but said the “disgusting thing” was Republicans who did not vote in favor.
“What they did was they cut a deal,” Burchett said in a video. “They cut a deal on an ethics vote on a Republican, and that’s just wrong.”
“I get disgusted about some things, but this is one that’s really, really bad,” Burchett added.
Rep. Kat Cammack (R-FL.) expressed a similar sentiment in a post: “Tonight, a handful of Republicans took a dive on a vote to strip [Stacey] Plaskett of her position on House intel because of her ties to Epstein. They did it to protect a Republican facing his own ethics issues from a similar vote. This backroom deal s— is swampy, wrong and always deserves to be called out.”
Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), who previously accused Mills of stolen valor, took direct aim at the congressman, writing in a post, “This. Is. Washington.”
Several outlets reported Wednesday that Mace is also planning to force a separate vote on censuring Mills.
According to a Washington Post analysis, the timestamps of the texts to Plaskett appeared to show Epstein was watching Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s former attorney and fixer, testify before the House Oversight Committee about the president.
In the resolution, Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) accused Plaskett of “inappropriate coordination” with Epstein, alleging she was “actively coached” by the late disgraced financier and helped advance “partisan attacks.” During a speech on the House floor, Plaskett said she received “innumerable texts” after the hearing started, and shot down claims that she was seeking advice from him.
“I got a text from Jeffrey Epstein, who at the time was my constituent, who was not public knowledge at that time that he was under federal investigation, and who is sharing information with me,” Plaskett said.
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