• Matt Gaetz withdrew from his attorney general bid on Thursday.
• But he's since hinted on X at a possible 2026 Florida governor run.
• Gov. Ron DeSantis of Floria terms out in 2026.

Former Rep. Matt Gaetz's bid for attorney general may have been short-lived, but he appears to have his sights set on another big career move.

In a Saturday tweet, Florida State Rep. Anthony Sabatini posted on X his prediction that Gaetz would be the next governor of Florida. Gaetz responded to Sabatini with a gif of the Florida state flag.

Gaetz resigned from Congress in November after President-elect Donald Trump had tapped him for attorney general.

But that bid soon soured when Gaetz became embroiled in fresh scandal, including new developments in a long-running sex-trafficking investigation against him. The DOJ declined to pursue charges against Gaetz in 2023, but the House Ethics Committee continued probing the allegations.

CNN reported on Thursday that Gaetz withdrew from consideration shortly after they contacted him for comment regarding an accusation that he had a sexual encounter with a 17-year-old at a party in 2017.

Gaetz has denied wrongdoing in the sex-trafficking probe and the encounter. However, he withdrew himself from consideration for the attorney general post on Thursday afternoon.

"While the momentum was strong, it is clear that my confirmation was unfairly becoming a distraction to the critical work of the Trump/Vance Transition," Gaetz wrote on X on Thursday.

After Gaetz withdrew, Trump wrote on Truth Social that he appreciated Gaetz's "efforts."

"He was doing very well but, at the same time, did not want to be a distraction for the Administration, for which he has much respect," Trump wrote.

"Matt has a wonderful future, and I look forward to watching all of the great things he will do!" Trump added.

Meanwhile in Florida, Gov. Ron DeSantis terms out in 2026. DeSantis, once a Trump protége, got on his former boss's bad side when he started running a short-lived, Elon-Musk-backed presidential race against Trump.

Florida has had a continuous slate of Republican governors since Jeb Bush won his gubernatorial race in 1998.

It's unclear what Gaetz's chances will look like in 2026 if he were to run for governor. But Gaetz is now in the market for a new gig — he said last week that he doesn't intend to rejoin the 119th Congress, to which he was elected in November to represent Florida's 1st congressional district.

"I'm still going to be in the fight, but it's going to be from a new perch," Gaetz told conservative podcaster Charlie Kirk last week.

"It seems like a pretty poetic time to allow that great new blood to come in, to allow my district to have high-quality representation," Gaetz said, adding that he's not going off on a "tropical excursion" for the rest of his life.

For now, he seems to be enjoying some downtime — fishing, spending time with his wife, Ginger, and making some bucks filming videos on Cameo like his former colleague, George Santos.

Gaetz did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider.

• Matt Gaetz announced Thursday his withdrawal from consideration to be US attorney general.
• He said his confirmation was "unfairly becoming a distraction" to Trump's team.
• It's the first major defeat that Trump has faced in staffing his new administration.

Matt Gaetz has withdrawn himself from consideration to be President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for US attorney general, the former Florida congressman announced on Thursday afternoon.

In a post on X, Gaetz said that the "momentum" behind his nomination was strong, but that his "confirmation was unfairly becoming a distraction" for the Trump-Vance transition team.

It comes after Gaetz began meeting with senators on Wednesday, accompanied by Vice President-elect Sen. JD Vance of Ohio.

"I greatly appreciate the recent efforts of Matt Gaetz in seeking approval to be Attorney General," Trump wrote on Truth Social after Gaetz announced his withdrawal. "He was doing very well but, at the same time, did not want to be a distraction for the Administration, for which he has much respect. Matt has a wonderful future, and I look forward to watching all of the great things he will do!"

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told The Washington Post that Gaetz's decision to withdraw "was appropriate."

While Gaetz's nomination had excited Trump's most ardent supporters, the Florida Republican faced an uphill battle for confirmation in the Senate, where lawmakers had questions about sex-trafficking allegations that have long dogged him.

The Department of Justice declined to pursue charges against Gaetz in 2023, but the House Ethics Committee continued a probe into the allegations, including speaking with witnesses. The panel met on Wednesday to determine whether it would release a long-awaited report on its investigation but ultimately deadlocked.

CNN reported that Gaetz withdrew from consideration shortly after it reached out to him for comment regarding accusations of a second sexual encounter with a 17-year-old at a party in 2017.

Meanwhile, Gaetz had taken the extraordinary step of resigning from the House after his nomination was announced, ostensibly to allow Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to quickly fill his House seat via a special election.

He had also said that he would not take the oath of office in January, despite being elected to serve another full two-year term through 2027.

It is unclear now whether Gaetz will follow through with that plan, and a spokesman did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment.

Gaetz's withdrawal represents Trump's first major loss in staffing up his incoming administration, though other nominees face confirmation challenges in the Senate.

• Matt Gaetz just withdrew from consideration after Donald Trump nominated him for US attorney general.
• Gaetz has been involved in controversies, including a DOJ sex-trafficking investigation.
• He led efforts to oust House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and is a longtime Trump loyalist.

Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida withdrew from consideration for the US attorney general position after President-elect Donald Trump nominated him for it.

Gaetz — a polarizing GOP lawmaker and far-right Trump loyalist — has been at the center of several controversies and investigations since his election to Congress in 2016.

Here's a look at Gaetz's background, political career, and potential future in the Trump White House.

Representatives for Gaetz did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Matt Gaetz comes from a prominent political family.

Gaetz's father, Don Gaetz, served in the Florida State Senate from 2006 to 2016, including a stint as its president from 2012 to 2014. In November, he was reelected to his old seat representing Florida Senate District 1.

Gaetz's grandfather, Jerry Gaetz, served in the North Dakota Senate and as the mayor of Rugby, North Dakota.

He grew up in Fort Walton Beach, Florida, and is a member of the Florida Bar.

Gaetz earned a bachelor's degree in interdisciplinary sciences from Florida State University and his law degree from William & Mary Law School.

Gaetz represented Florida's 4th district in the Florida House of Representatives from 2010 to 2016.

He is married to Ginger Luckey, a Harvard Business School graduate who works in accounting.

Gaetz and Luckey met at Mar-a-Lago in 2020 and wed a year later.

Her brother, Palmer Luckey, founded the virtual reality company Oculus and is a billionaire Republican donor.

As a member of Congress, Gaetz became known for attention-seeking stunts on the House floor.

Gaetz was elected to represent Florida's 1st district in the House of Representatives in 2016.

A month after becoming a member of Congress in 2017, Gaetz introduced a bill to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency.

In 2018, he invited Charles C. Johnson, an alt-right figure who has denied the Holocaust, to the State of the Union. Gaetz told The Daily Beast that he gave Johnson a ticket after he "showed up at my office" on the day of the speech but that the two did not know each other.

In 2019, he barged into a deposition of a former National Security Council official connected to Trump's impeachment inquiry. A meeting transcript showed that Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Adam Schiff swiftly kicked him out of the room, telling the lawmaker, "Mr. Gaetz, take your statement to the press. They do you no good here. So please, absent yourself."

During a 2020 vote to approve $8.3 billion in emergency funding for coronavirus aid, Gaetz wore a gas mask on the House floor.

In 2021, he went on an "America First" tour with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene in which the two lawmakers repeated Trump's false claim that the 2020 election was "stolen."

Gaetz is also known for insulting his Democratic and Republican colleagues alike, calling Sen. Mitch McConnell "McFailure," deriding Utah Senator-elect John Curtis as "Mitt Romney without good hair," and calling abortion rights activists "ugly" and "overweight."

He was investigated by the Justice Department and the House Ethics Committee regarding allegations of sexual misconduct.

In April 2021, The New York Times reported that the Justice Department was investigating whether Gaetz had sex with a 17-year-old girl and paid for her to travel with him using campaign funds, which would violate federal sex-trafficking laws.

The House Ethics Committee then announced that it would launch its own investigation into Gaetz's conduct. Gaetz denied the allegations.

In February 2023, the Justice Department ended its sex-trafficking investigation without bringing criminal charges against Gaetz, prompting the House Ethics Committee to reopen its own inquiry.

Gaetz successfully led efforts to remove Rep. Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House in 2023.

When Republicans retook control of the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterms, McCarthy was elected Speaker of the House in a tumultuous process that lasted several days and nearly came to blows on the House floor.

McCarthy made concessions to secure votes from Gaetz and other far-right GOP lawmakers, including allowing any House member to file a "motion to vacate" the House Speaker role.

Dissatisfied with McCarthy's leadership, Gaetz introduced a motion to vacate against him months later. The House voted McCarthy out in October 2023.

McCarthy appeared to reference Gaetz while speaking at Georgetown University in April, saying that he lost his job as House Speaker because "one person wanted me to stop an ethics complaint because he slept with a 17-year-old," Politico reported. In response, Gaetz called McCarthy a "liar."

After winning the 2024 election, Trump nominated Gaetz, a longtime loyalist, for US attorney general.

"Matt will root out the systemic corruption at DOJ and return the Department to its true mission of fighting Crime and upholding our Democracy and Constitution," Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social announcing Gaetz's nomination.

The appointment, which requires Senate confirmation, would have put Gaetz in charge of the Department of Justice, the same organizational body that once investigated sex-trafficking allegations against him.

While Republicans have a majority in the Senate, some Republican lawmakers expressed skepticism about Gaetz's chances of being confirmed.

Lisa Murkowski of Arkansas told MSNBC that she didn't think Gaetz was "a serious nomination for the attorney general."

GOP Rep. Max Miller told CNN, "I don't think Matt cares if he gets confirmed or not. Everybody's talking about him, and that's what he likes the most."

Gaetz resigned from the House of Representatives the day his Cabinet nomination was announced.

Gaetz resigned two days before the House Ethics Committee was scheduled to vote on releasing the report from its investigation. His replacement in Congress will be chosen through a special election.

Although the House Ethics Committee no longer has jurisdiction over former members and did not reach an agreement in that meeting, it could still vote to release the report.

Gaetz withdrew himself from consideration for attorney general, saying that his nomination was "unfairly becoming a distraction."

In a post announcing his withdrawal on X, Gaetz wrote, "While the momentum was strong, it is clear that my confirmation was unfairly becoming a distraction to the critical work of the Trump/Vance Transition."

Trump echoed Gaetz's reasoning in a post on Truth Social, writing that Gaetz "was doing very well but, at the same time, did not want to be a distraction for the Administration, for which he has much respect."

Trump's post continued: "Matt has a wonderful future, and I look forward to watching all of the great things he will do!"