Former Congressman Matt Gaetz said that Alan Ritchson was “just looking for Hollywood attention,” when he referred to his former schoolmate as a “motherf–ker” in a recent interview and that the two were actually friends back in the day.
“Hollywood apparently changes people,” Gaetz, who resigned from Congress in November and stepped down as Trump’s pick for Attorney General amidst sexual misconduct allegations, tweeted in response to Ritchson’s comments in a GQ interview earlier this week.
Gaetz insisted,“We were not ‘adversaries’ as I won debate championships and Alan did more acting stuff… He was always very nice to me (and everyone) and his mother, the computer lab monitor, loved me.”
Gaetz added, “Spoiler alert: We were not adversaries… He’s just trying to get Hollywood attention (but not just with the steroids).”
Ritchson, who plays the title character in the Prime Video series “Reacher,” told GQ that Gaetz is “just not a good dude.”
He also said, “It’s shocking to me that the panhandle of Florida continues to vote for somebody — knowing everything we know about him and the promises he’s made behind closed doors about pardoning certain criminals.”
The actor, who also appeared in “Fast X” and “The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare,” said he might be interested in running for office himself, but, “I’m not duplicitous enough to succeed in politics.”
In a report released in December, Gaetz was found by the House Ethics Committee to have violated the House’s standard of conduct rules, charges which he has denied.
