On Tuesday, Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz sent the following tweet to Donald Trump’s former fixer Michael Cohen:

Hey @MichaelCohen212 - Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot... — Matt Gaetz (@mattgaetz) February 26, 2019

Gaetz’s threat comes on the eve of Cohen’s public testimony about the president’s involvement in schemes to buy the silence of adult actress Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal in order to prevent the public from discovering that a man famous for being unfaithful to his various wives was still sleeping around. There’s a complicated moral calculus surrounding these payoffs: It’s obviously good any time Donald Trump has less money, but it might also have been good for the public to have evidence that Trump is an immoral jerk who shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near government power. On the other hand, the public already had mountains of evidence that Trump was an immoral jerk who shouldn’t have been allowed anywhere near government power on Nov. 8, 2016, and elected him anyway, so it’s possible the payoffs were nothing more than a waste of Trump’s money, which, again, would be something to applaud. On the other hand, Gaetz’s tweet threatening Cohen the night before he testifies seems to be a little easier to parse. For more on this, let’s check in with what looks like every single law professor in America. Here’s Ryan Goodman of NYU:

Hey @mattgaetz - Does your personal attorney know you’ve just engaged, very clearly, in the crime of witness tampering? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. https://t.co/d4d1O7nnMw — Ryan Goodman (@rgoodlaw) February 26, 2019

Here’s Steve Vladeck of the University of Texas:

Hey @mattgaetz:



Do you know about 18 U.S.C. § 1512(b), which prohibits tampering with witnesses to official proceedings?:https://t.co/4ZZ2jQ0Qrs https://t.co/t7XMXITlNb — Steve Vladeck (@steve_vladeck) February 26, 2019

Here’s Rick Hasen of UC–Irvine:

Not a joke----and I don't think that such comments on Twitter would be protected by legislative immunity even if they could be privileged if uttered on the House floor. https://t.co/NZJvwpDiln — Rick Hasen (@rickhasen) February 26, 2019

Here’s Anthony Michael Kreis of Chicago-Kent:

Does the Speech and Debate Clause apply to Twitter? Asking for a Florida Congressman. — Anthony Michael Kreis (@AnthonyMKreis) February 26, 2019

Here’s Laurence Tribe of Harvard:

.@mattgaetz is a disgusting excuse for a human being. He’s also engaged in criminal witness tampering in plain sight. No immunity is available. He deserves to be indicted, and of course needs to be kicked out of Congress.https://t.co/nTg9KzSwMW — Laurence Tribe (@tribelaw) February 26, 2019

In fact, there seem to be only two members of the legal establishment willing to defend Gaetz’s actions. The first is one Matthew Louis Gaetz II, a 2007 graduate of the College of William and Mary. Although Gaetz is himself a sitting congressman, he nevertheless seems to feel that there was nothing untoward about Gaetz’s tweet, which he described as “witness testing” rather than witness tampering.

Rep. Matt Gaetz defended his tweet directed at Michael Cohen, saying it should not be perceived as a threat https://t.co/aYIcGo5zvO pic.twitter.com/YX5q6fkJnW — CBS News (@CBSNews) February 26, 2019

Rep. Gaetz further elaborated his defense of Rep. Gaetz in an interview with the Daily Beast, saying, “This is what it looks like to compete in the marketplace of ideas.” But Gaetz has something of a conflict of interest here, in the sense that he, himself, is Matt Gaetz. Only one prominent lawyer who was not Gaetz was willing to defend Gaetz’s actions, and he hasn’t been a real player since the 1970s. Here’s Tom Hagen of (presumably) USC, leading by example:

Now that’s ethical lawyering! Unfortunately, one of the mildest responses to Gaetz’s tweet came from Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who warned that the Committee on Ethics might look into the matter because tweeting threats about exposing a private citizen’s alleged infidelities the night before he testifies about the president’s criminal conduct might “be construed as not reflecting creditably on the House”:

I encourage all Members to be mindful that comments made on social media or in the press can adversely affect the ability of House Committees to obtain the truthful and complete information necessary to fulfill their duties. https://t.co/NDnxkaiFCA pic.twitter.com/DIIgSHgeb5 — Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) February 26, 2019

Be mindful, Matt Gaetz!

Update, Feb. 27, 2018: After receiving implicit criticism from Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Gaetz deleted his original tweet and sent a new one Tuesday night, apologizing for his earlier remarks: