What Is 'Cawthorned' And Is It Happening To Matt Gaetz? The Political Slang Term's Meaning Explained

Matt Gaetz does not appear to have a lot of friends right now among his peers. After successfully leading the charge to get Kevin McCarthy ousted as Speaker of the House, it looks to many like the 200-plus Congressional Republicans who voted to keep McCarthy are fed up with the radical Florida Congressman and are spilling damaging stories about him to the press.

For onlookers, it looks like Republicans are "Cawthorning" Gaetz. In case you have no idea what that means and may have seen it making the rounds online recently, let's explain the origin, meaning and usage behind the slang term.

What Is "Cawthorned?"

Madison Cawthorn was a one-time Republican congressman who served from 2020-2022. Like Gaetz, Cawthorn was a young and contentious figure with a tentative grasp of memes and a staunchly hard-right conservative in the MAGA camp.

In his brief tenure, he ruffled the feathers of some more moderate Republicans in his party, but many apparently felt he crossed a line in March 2022 when he went on a podcast and said his colleagues had invited him to "drug-fueled, naked parties."

This was just two months before Cawthorn's first primary election, and in that time, a number of lurid scandals about the congressman happened to appear in the press. These included photos of him in women's lingerie, a video of him nakedly thrusting in a male friend's face, and an insinuation that he had an incestuous relationship with his aide, who also happened to be his second cousin.

At the time, Cawthorn attempted to paint the stories as jokes and misunderstandings, blaming old-guard Republicans, aka "RINOs," for leaking the scandals and saying they wanted him gone because he "threatened the status quo." Whatever the case, Cawthorn lost in the May 2022 primary and was out of Congress by the end of the year.

Is Matt Gaetz Getting "Cawthorned?"

Matt Gaetz has long been embroiled in a major controversy, as he faces allegations that he trafficked a minor across state lines. Developments in the case have largely been slow to come out, as the House Ethics Committee is supposed to have been looking into Gaetz to see if he committed any violations. After this week's dramatic axing of McCarthy, however, it seems his Republican colleagues have begun to informally mobilize against Gaetz.

The biggest bombshell came from Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin, who went on CNN to make the jaw-dropping claim that in his time in Congress, Gaetz purportedly showed videos of the underage girls he'd slept with and also bragged about "crushing ED pills," which he'd "chase with energy drinks," so that he could "go all night."

Mullin: Gaetz bragged about how he would crush E.D. Medicine and chase it with energy drinks so he could go all night pic.twitter.com/MbbG1nvryc

— Acyn (@Acyn) October 5, 2023

Others have hurled less lurid insults at Gaetz, but to onlookers, the parallels between the comments and the stories about Madison Cawthorn that came out in the wake of his angering of the party were all too clear: It seems like Republicans want Gaetz gone and are spilling very damaging stories about him to the press in order to tank his political career.

Will The "Cawthorning" Of Gaetz Succeed?

Obviously, it's too early to tell and it will depend on a variety of factors. Gaetz is up for reelection in 2024, and it will be interesting to see if more stories, perhaps with some more scandalous images, come out between now and the primary season.

It's also possible the House Ethics Committee will suddenly speed up their investigation into Gaetz and find him guilty — when Gaetz was banging the drum about vacating McCarthy, a Republican insider told the press that Republicans would vote to expel Gaetz from Congress if he was found guilty.

Should that happen, it's difficult to imagine Gaetz finding friends in Congress who would save his job. It's plausible to assume that he has less than 10 allies in Congress (only he and seven other Republicans voted to kick out McCarthy), and it's unlikely that he would find enough support between over 200 Republicans and all 212 Democrats to keep him around.

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For more information, check out the Cawthorned entry on Know Your Meme.