Outgoing Manhattan Rep. Carolyn Maloney is facing a potential House ethics investigation for allegedly soliciting a ticket to the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s annual gala after she fell off the invite list in 2016.
The House Ethics Committee announced Monday it is continuing to weigh a full investigation into the matter, four months after receiving a referral that found there was reason to question whether Maloney, a Democrat who chairs the House Oversight Committee, violated chamber rules and federal law.
In a 15-page referral from the Office of Congressional Ethics made public Monday, Maloney is accused of making a phone call to former museum president referred to as “Witness A” in March 2016 to request a ticket to the Met Gala after Maloney learned organizers didn’t plan to invite her that year.
The phone call, laid out in a contemporaneous email from the former museum president to executives, noted Maloney was “unhappy to say the least that she is not receiving an invitation to the Party of the Year,” a reference to the Met Gala.
The report does not name Witness A. But the email, which was included as an exhibit and did not redact the sender’s name, makes clear it is Emily Rafferty, who was Met president from 2005 to 2015.
“[Maloney] went on about how much she does for the Met, always responsive when you call, and proactive re the institution’s concerns in DC,” Rafferty wrote in the April 2, 2016 email, which is included in the referral. “She has been coming to the party for years, and it is the one thing she cares about.”
Maloney went on to receive an invite to the Met Gala in 2016 and attended several years since.
House rules prohibit members of Congress from accepting gifts worth more than $50, but allow them to go to “widely attended” events for free if they are offered an unsolicited ticket. But the rules draw the line at actively soliciting an invitation to an event, which has now landed Maloney at the center of an official investigation.
In a statement, Maloney spokesperson Adrien Lesser said Maloney is “confident the House Ethics Committee will dismiss this matter.”
“Although the Committee has not made any determination a violation occurred, she is disappointed by the unproven and disputed allegations in the report issued by Office of Congressional Ethics and strongly disagrees with its referral,” Lesser said.
The House Ethics Committee announced Monday it would gather more information after reviewing the June referral from the board of the nonpartisan Office of Congressional Ethics, which concluded there is “substantial reason to believe that Rep. Maloney may have solicited or accepted impermissible gifts associated with her attendance at the Met Gala.”
The board’s report included emails from people associated with the Met that showed politicians valued invites to the annual gala, which attracts some of the world’s biggest celebrities and is chaired by Anna Wintour, global editorial director of Vogue and a Met trustee.
In one 2018 email, the Met’s former chief government relations officer — whose name is redacted in the report — noted Maloney “pushed back” when she wasn’t invited. The former officer also noted that when the Met cut back on the number of government officials invited, it saw a significant drop in funding from the New York City Council.
“In fact during budget advocacy when presenting the Museum’s request for new funding we were told by one Council Member ‘get Anna to pay for it,’” the email reads.
Maloney, meanwhile, is set to relinquish her seat in Congress at the beginning of next year after serving in the House since 1993. She lost a primary to fellow Rep. Jerry Nadler after they were redistricted into the same Manhattan-based House district earlier this year.
