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By Rachel Dobkin
Weekend Reporter
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Representative Brandon Williams, a New York Republican, has revealed that his daughter has an OnlyFans account after he said former aides threatened to go public with the information after they were fired.
Williams' relationship with his former chief of staff, Michael Gordon, soured after the first-term congressman gave his top aide 30 days to find new employment. Gordon, who lived in Williams' home during the congressman's campaign, threatened to out Williams' 27-year-old daughter's OnlyFans account, Williams told Politico in an interview posted Friday. OnlyFans is a platform in which people pay for sexually explicit content.
Gordon told Politico that "the allegations Congressman Williams has levied against me are categorically false." Ryan Sweeney, Williams' former legislative director, said the "congressman's allegations are completely false."
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Newsweek reached out to Williams' office via phone and email and to Sweeney via LinkedIn. Newsweek also reached out to Gordon via his official House email address and attempted to reach him via X, formerly Twitter.
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Days before Williams went public with details about the feud, a video that a Syracuse University student shared of a confrontation between Gordon and Williams went viral. In the video, which Sweeney filmed, Williams can be seen pointing a finger in Gordon's face, saying, "You f*** with my family, I'll end every relationship that you have!"
Sweeney then taunted Williams about his daughter, off-camera, according to Williams. The congressman said Gordon was "trying to exert some leverage over me and I just simply won't allow that to happen."
Williams, who won his seat by 1 percentage point, received backlash after the video was shared on November 30 on X. Representative George Santos—a New York Republican who was expelled from Congress on December 1 after a House Ethics Committee report said investigators found "substantial" proof that he broke federal criminal laws—called for an Ethics Committee investigation of Williams, stemming from his behavior in the video. Williams and other New York Republicans led the charge to expel Santos.
Williams told Politico that the confrontation in the video stemmed from Gordon's actions after he was given 30 days' notice to find a new job. Gordon contacted Aaron Evans, a GOP campaign consultant close to Williams. Evans told Politico that he went to Williams in recent weeks to relay a message from Gordon: Before going through with firing his top aide, Williams should consider the potential embarrassment his family would face if TMZ found out about his daughter's Only Fans account.
It is unclear why Gordon and Sweeney were fired, and Williams refused to go into specifics. Critics have pointed out Williams' high turnover rate. He has had three times more turnover than the average House member, according to Legistorm, a nonpartisan website.
Santos said on X on Friday, that Williams' "office has the highest turnover rate from all the freshmen members because he's an arrogant pompous drunk and aggressively goes after people that cross his path.
"This is a smear on these young staffers that left his office for being mistreated and berated on a regular basis," Santos wrote, in part.
In his interview with Politico, Williams said he was reshaping his office culture by removing people that Gordon hired, adding that he now has a team he is proud of.
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