House Ethics Committee launches investigation into Madison Cawthorn

By Annie Grayer and Melanie Zanona, CNN

The House Committee on Ethics is launching an investigation into GOP Rep. Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina to determine whether he was involved in financial improprieties or had an improper relationship with an individual on his staff, the committee announced Monday.

The committee voted unanimously on May 11 to establish an investigative subcommittee.

“The Investigative Subcommittee shall have jurisdiction to determine whether Representative Madison Cawthorn may have: improperly promoted a cryptocurrency in which he may have had an undisclosed financial interest, and engaged in an improper relationship with an individual employed on his congressional staff,” the release reads.

When asked to respond to the investigation’s announcement, Cawthorn’s chief of staff Blake Harp said the office welcomes “the opportunity to prove that Congressman Cawthorn committed no wrongdoing and that he was falsely accused by partisan adversaries for political gain.

“This inquiry is a formality,” Harp said in a statement. “Our office isn’t deterred in the slightest from completing the job the patriots of Western North Carolina sent us to Washington to accomplish.”

Cawthorn lost his reelection bid in North Carolina last week after sparking uproar in the Republican Party for claiming that he had been invited to an orgy in Washington and had personally seen leaders in the effort to curb drug addiction doing cocaine.

In the runup to the North Carolina primary, Cawthorn faced a barrage of negative headlines many prompted by material put out by an opposition group actively looking to unseat the freshman Republican.

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