Matt Gaetz just released a short statement on the social media site X explaining his decision to drop out of consideration for the attorney general role in Donald Trump's upcoming White House administration.

Donald Trump's controversial pick for US attorney general - Matt Gaetz - is withdrawing his name from consideration.

Gaetz is facing allegations that he paid for sex, including with a 17-year-old. It was a subject of a House ethics investigation that has yet to be released.

"I had excellent meetings with Senators yesterday," Gaetz just wrote on X. "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. There is no time to waste on a needlessly protracted Washington scuffle, thus I'll be withdrawing my name from consideration to serve as Attorney General."

There’s been a flurry of activity in the halls of the US Capitol today but we have learned precious little more about the controversy over Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general, former Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz

The House ethics committee was deadlocked in a vote about whether to release a report into allegations that Gaetz paid for sex, including with a 17-year-old, and used illegal drugs. Gaetz has denied the allegations.

Members remain tight-lipped about the discussions that happened in the meeting. It’s possible we wouldn’t have even heard that a vote happened were it not for dueling statements by Republican Chair Michael Guest and ranking Democratic Party member Susan Wild.

In other developments today:

• Donald Trump tapped former acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker to be US Ambassador to Nato
• JD Vance, the vice-president-elect, met with Senators to push Trump’s cabinet picks
• Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy published an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal with some more details on their Trump-endorsed government cost-cutting efforts. They’ll focus, they say, on slashing regulation, reducing the number of federal employees and cutting what they call “unauthorised” government spending.

We're wrapping up our live coverage of today's US politics, but you can read more about the fate of the Gaetz ethics report here.

Image source, EPA

Matt Gaetz is one of Donald Trump's most controversial cabinet picks, in part because of the importance of the job he's been selected for.

The attorney general is sometimes called the “top cop” – they serve as the country’s top law enforcement official.

The current post-holder is Merrick Garland, appointed by President Joe Biden. The attorney general oversees the US Justice Department including the Federal Bureau of Investigation and other law enforcement bodies such as the Drug Enforcement Administration.

Donald Trump says he picked Gaetz because he wanted to “root out the systemic corruption” and end “weaponized” law enforcement.

Trump believes that he and his allies have been unfairly targeted by the justice department and they want wholesale changes in the way law enforcement agencies operate.

Gaetz is not afraid of aggressive political manoeuvres – he was the leading force behind the removal of Republican Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy last year.

If he’s confirmed – an uncertain prospect at the moment – he could for instance slow or completely halt the investigation into the riot at the Capitol on 6 January 2021, or direct resources into investigations of Biden administration officials or other Trump opponents.

Republican congressman Mark Alford has told the BBC he does not think the House ethics committee report on Matt Gaetz should be released.

Speaking with Sumi Somaskanda, Alford says releasing the report would set a “bad precedent” because Gaetz is no longer officially in the US House of Representatives.

Alford says that because Gaetz is no longer in congress, the investigation “should be kept private”.

When asked by Somaskanda if Gaetz going for the role of attorney general should impact the release of the report, Alford said the Senate has the power “to do its own investigation”.

“Through the confirmation process… they will be able to ask Matt Gaetz anything they want to, and he has pledged to give them truthful answers,” Alford says, adding that Gaetz has maintained his innocence.

Glenn Ivey, a Democratic congressman who serves on the House committee on ethics, has just been speaking with BBC North America chief presenter Sumi Somaskanda about today's meeting

Ivey says he wants to be able to turn over the information they have gathered in the Matt Gaetz investigation to the Senate by 5 December.

For Gaetz to become Donald Trump’s attorney general, he will need to be confirmed by the Senate.

“The President has the right to pick who he wants. The Senate also has the right… to reject that person, if they don't think he's up to the task,” Ivey said.

“I want to make sure they get all the information they need to make an informed decision.

“Everything that we have collected in the process of our investigation, whether that's interviews of witnesses or the like. I'm in favour of turning all of that over to the Senate.”

Susan Wild, the ranking Democratic member of the House ethics committee, said she broke her silence only after committee chair Michael Guest did so.

But that’s as far as she went – other than saying there was a 5-5 vote along party lines, she refused to give more details about what was discussed in the committee’s two-hour meeting today.

She said Guest implied there was agreement that the report on Matt Gaetz should remain confidential, but that wasn’t the case – “there most definitely was not”.

“In order to affirmatively move something forward, somebody has to cross party lines and vote with the other side,” she told reporters.

Claire Betzer
US reporter

As Vice-President-elect JD Vance tries to shore up support on Capitol Hill for some of Donald Trump's more divisive cabinet picks, Americast heard from a defender of the president-elect's controversial choice to lead the US Defense Department.

Robert Wilkie is leading Trump's defence policy transition. He tells Americast that Defense Secretary hopeful Pete Hegseth shows the president-elect's "focus on disrupting the status quo".

"I think what President Trump is aiming for is someone who speaks to the troops," Wilkie says. He pushes back on the criticism of Hegseth surrounding whether the Fox News host is capable of running one of the world's largest bureaucracies, saying "experience can cut both ways".

"The current secretary of defense [Lloyd Austin]... has enormous experience... And I don't know that anyone in the national security world would argue that under Secretary Austin, the Pentagon has been run well," Wilkie says.

What else is happening behind the scenes of Trump's defence transition, and what could it mean for US military power?

Listen to the latest episode of Americast to hear Robert Wilkie's view on US policy towards Ukraine and trends in American military culture here on BBC Sounds, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Image source, Getty Images

The House Ethics Committee is debating if it should release its report on Matt Gaetz. The issue at hand is that Gaetz resigned from the House last week after Donald Trump announced he wanted him to be Attorney General.

House Speaker Mike Johnson has called for the report to not be released, saying: “the rules of the House have always been that a former member is beyond the jurisdiction of the Ethics Committee”.

But there is some precedent to release it.

Former Tennessee congressman Bill Boner found himself under investigation by the House ethics committee for mis-using campaign funds, among other things, back in the 1980s.

He resigned on 5 October, 1987 to become mayor of Nashville. The House ethics committee determined a few months later that Boner did mis-use campaign funds, he failed to disclose gifts and he accepted bribes.

The Ethics Committee released its report after Boner left congress.

"In the committee’s view, the general policy against issuing reports in cases such as here involved is outweighed by the responsibility of the Committee to fully inform the public regarding the status and results of its efforts up to the date of Representative Boner’s departure from Congress," the Ethics Committee said at the time.

Cai Pigliucci
Reporting from Capitol Hill

Image source, Cai Pigliucci / BBC

Ranking member Susan Wild just stepped up to give a statement on behalf of all the Democratic Party members on the house ethics committee

She said it was not her “intention to make any comment” but after she heard Chair Michael Guest do so, and in her words “betray the process”, she felt compelled to speak. Wild says in her opinion, Guest had mis-characterised today's meeting.

She said Guest implied there was an agreement of the committee to not disclose the report on Gaetz - Wild says that is untrue.

Wild acknowledged that a vote was taken, but it was not unanimous.

The committee is made up of five Republicans and five Democrats, and Wild says it takes a member crossing party lines for anything to happen.

She said clearly “there was no consensus on this issue”.

They’ve also agreed to reconvene on 5 December to consider this again.

When asked if the report was complete, she said she didn’t care to comment on the status of it except to say they were in a position to vote today.

The House Ethics Committee chair Michael Guest has just emerged from the meeting room.

With a large scrum of reporters and cameras waiting for him, he gave no definitive answer of what happened today during the two-hour meeting.

He did say there was no agreement made on if the report on Matt Gaetz would be released.

It's not clear if a vote was held to release the report.

Cai Pigliucci
Reporting from Capitol Hill

We’ve just seen a few members exiting the nearly two-hour long House Ethics Committee meeting where reporters have been staked out outside waiting for news on the possibility of a vote to release the report on Matt Gaetz.

We do not know yet if there’s been a vote on whether to release this report on Gaetz - those that have left so far say they cannot say anything about it.

Michael Guest, the GOP chairman of the House Ethics committee, told reporters on Capitol Hill earlier today that he has "some reservations" about releasing a report on Attorney General nominee Matt Gaetz because it's still going through the review process.

The report is not yet complete, Guest told reporters.

A number of Democrats are pushing for the report to be released, while some Republicans have argued it goes against protocols as Gaetz resigned from his seat and is no longer a member of congress.

Guest told reporters he has not heard from Trump or his transition team on the matter.

We're still waiting for the committee to emerge from its meeting, where they are discussing the Gaetz report.

Stick with us.

Mike Wendling
US digital reporter

Writing in the Wall Street Journal, businessmen and Trump allies Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have set out a few more details about their plans to slash government spending.

Donald Trump has enlisted the pair in an effort called named after a cryptocurrency, Doge - Department of Government Efficiency.

Contrary to the name, it's not an official government department but an outside advisory panel. Musk and Ramaswamy write that they will “hire a lean team of small-government crusaders, including some of the sharpest technical and legal minds in America.” Musk has previously hinted that the positions would be unpaid.

They’ll focus, they say, on slashing regulation, reducing the number of federal employees and cutting government spending.

Previously Musk has suggested cutting $2tn (£1.6tn) out of the nearly $7tn (£5.5tn) US federal budget. In their newspaper piece today, external, a relatively more modest sum of $500bn (£395bn) - “annual federal expenditures that are unauthorized by Congress” - is mentioned.

However, a large proportion of US government spending is on mandatory welfare programs known as “entitlements”, including health care and pension payments for the elderly, which Trump has pledged to protect.

And Congress and cabinet picks such as Robert F Kennedy Jr – who wants more regulation of food and the pharmaceutical industry – may balk at chopping rules and budgets.

“We expect to prevail,” the pair write, “Now is the moment for decisive action.”

Rachel Looker
Reporting from Capitol Hill

Image source, Reuters

I just spoke with several senators during votes about Gaetz's potential appointment as attorney general.

Lawmakers spoke shortly before the House ethics committee hearing that will potentially determine whether to release their investigatory report on the Florida lawmaker.

North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis, a Republican, says the committee must make the decision whether it’s appropriate to release the report, after Gaetz resigned from Congress.

He said he’ll honour the committee's decision.

“Let’s get rid of the notion that somehow we’re not going to know anything about the nominee. It will be out there,” he adds.

Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, a Democrat who serves as the Senate majority whip, says he's called on the committee to release its report.

“They have a lot of work to do” he tells reporters, referencing Republicans' work to get Gaetz confirmed as attorney general.

Oklahoma Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin calls it “an extremely difficult path” for Gaetz.

“It’s more and more people are just saying they’re not voting for him and so I think it’s a very difficult path for him to get there, but he has a right to push as hard as he wants to,” he says.

Mike Wendling
US digital reporter

Image source, Reuters

During the election campaign Donald Trump pledged heavy retribution against his opponents. And now that he is the president-elect, he hasn’t let up.

Today he posted on his Truth Social network: “This is what the Radical Left Lunatics do to people. They dirty them up, they destroy them, and then they spit them out.

“They are trying that right now with some great American Patriots who are only trying to fix the mess that the Democrats have made of our Country. WE WILL WIN!!! MAGA”.

It’s unclear what or who he’s talking about, but given the timing it’s very possible that he could be referring to the controversy over his nominee for attorney general, Matt Gaetz.

Trump has made it clear he wants his picks confirmed in any way possible, including “recess appointments” – filling posts when the Senate is not meeting, in order to circumvent confirmation hearings.

But a Supreme Court ruling a decade ago put a virtual halt to that tactic.

When Trump takes office in January, significant power will reside in the Republican majority in the Senate – hardly a nest of “Radical Left Lunatics”.

But it’s far from clear whether those senators will buck Trump – or what will happen if they do.

Rachel Looker
Reporting from Capitol Hill

As we wait outside the House ethics committee room, staffers exiting nearby elevators double take at the large crowd of reporters in the hallways.

One staffer’s eyes widened when he surveyed the reporters swarming the hall.

There’s also increased security outside the hearing room. Capitol Police are repeatedly shouting at reporters to keep a clear pathway in the hallways.

Some of US President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet picks look likely to face a fierce confirmation battle in Washington as their fitness to safeguard the rule of law, national security and public health comes under scrutiny.

But while the prospective appointees could face pushback in the Senate, they have received a largely positive reception so far from Republican voters contacted by the BBC.

Virtually all of them approve of his cabinet picks, hailing them as much-needed disruptors to what they see as a corrupt establishment.

David Pautsch, a Trump supporter from Davenport, Iowa, tells the BBC that "they're all wonderful."

Indiana resident Alli Rastrelli, 20, says she is happy with some of Trump's cabinet selections like Gabbard and Kennedy, even if she does question their credentials.

• There's more opinions to read on Trump's nominations in this article

Rachel Looker
Reporting from Capitol Hill

I’m standing outside the House ethics committee meeting. It’s a real media frenzy, with a large group of reporters and cameras crowding the door.

We're awaiting the results of a possible vote by the 10-member committee over whether to release a report into Matt Gaetz, Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general, a role often referred to as “top cop”.

Gaetz has faced allegations of sexual misconduct, including sex with a 17-year-old, human trafficking and illegal drug use. The former congressman has never been arrested or criminally charged, and denies all the charges against him.

If the committee is voting on the Gaetz report, it is likely all Democrats will vote to release it. It would take just one Republican to join them to achieve a committee majority.

But even if the ethics committee votes to release its report – and right now it’s unclear how the vote would go – it’s unknown when it would be released.

Cai Pigliucci
Reporting from Capitol Hill

Image source, BBC / Cai Pigliucci

Outside the Strom Thurmond room on the Senate side of the Capitol, Senators Kennedy and Vance just walked out together.

Kennedy says, "It was good" in replying to a shouted question on the meeting with Gaetz.

Vance is going in and out of the meetings so that he can vote on the Senate floor.

Senator Susan Collins also walks by reporters here. Asked if she's going to meet with Gaetz, she says: "I've not had any requests to meet with any of the nominees yet except for Representative (Elise) Stefanik, and I am going to be meeting with her." Stefanik is Trump's pick for UN ambassador.

Republican Senator Collins, along with Senator Lisa Murkowski, are the most moderate members of the conference and have expressed concerns over Gaetz’s nomination. Collins has previously said she was "shocked" by Trump's pick for AG.

If every Democrat votes against him, Gaetz can afford to lose three Republican votes in the Senate - Murkowski and Collins may account for two of them.

Image source, BBC / Cai Pigliucci

I also caught Senator Lisa Murkowski coming off the Senate subway.

I asked if she's planning to meet with Gaetz. She said, "I don’t know", adding that "Nobody gets any job until we have to get through the whole process. Which is in January."