AIPAC fires back at Matt Gaetz for claim Congress members had to wear ‘demoralizing’ QR codes at fundraisers

A pro-Israel lobbying organization took aim at former GOP Rep. Matt Gaetz after he recounted having to wear “demoralizing” QR codes at a donor event.

The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) claimed Gaetz was “confused” after he recalled a reception during his appearance on Tim Pool’s podcast, Timcast.

“I saw the way AIPAC worked, and that was weird for like a country lawyer like me. I remember my first AIPAC reception, and like your fundraiser tells you, you have to go, and your chief of staff tells you you have to go, your committee chairmen all tell you you have to go,” Gaetz said.

“At my first AIPAC reception, you had to wear a name badge with a QR code, talk to donors, and if they liked you, they scanned it to donate on the spot.”@mattgaetz on the surreal, humiliating world of AIPAC fundraisers. pic.twitter.com/bIIbLx9wMZ

— Timcast News (@TimcastNews) October 8, 2025

“You get there and you wear this name badge and I remember there’s a QR code on it, and what we were supposed to do was go talk to donors, and then if they liked you, they scanned your QR code to make a donation, like on the spot,” the former Florida Republican continued.

“Can you just imagine how demoralizing that is? To like be told that your job for the next several hours is to go chat people up, hoping they would scan you like a can of tomato soup on the way out of the meeting?” he added.

“So I saw that and I was like, ‘That is so freaking weird,’ and then, you know, I was in Israel. I went multiple times, and I did not like the fact that I found someone in my room rooting around in my stuff,” Gaetz continued.

“They should not have been there; it’s the King David Hotel. When I came back to my room, no one was expecting me to be back in my room– I don’t know who it was, I just thought like, this is weird,” he said. “All of these things combined are odd, and then the policy outgrowth seems to be an obsession about the Middle East that has not served my generation well.”

AIPAC responded on X, claiming Gaetz’s remarks were a “lie.”

The accusation about our fundraisers is, of course, a lie.

Barcodes are on name badges for security reasons, not fundraising, and are scanned for that purpose.

Maybe @mattgaetz was confused because he wanted people to scan his barcode, and they didn’t even want to talk to him. https://t.co/cXQkBCLMVK

— AIPAC (@AIPAC) October 8, 2025

“The accusation about our fundraisers is, of course, a lie. Barcodes are on name badges for security reasons, not fundraising, and are scanned for that purpose,” the organization posted. “Maybe @mattgaetz was confused because he wanted people to scan his barcode, and they didn’t even want to talk to him.”

But AIPAC’s post seemed to backfire as X users called out some inconvenient facts.

pic.twitter.com/8f3GYlBDl2

— B L A K E L E Y℠©® LLC (@_iamblakeley) October 9, 2025

AIPAC events are political meat markets.

— Nick Szabo (@NickSzabo4) October 8, 2025

Barcodes may be on there for security badges, but he said QR codes.

— Katie (@katie_k8nurse) October 9, 2025

“security reasons”

— GoLongNotShort (@GoLongNotShort) October 9, 2025

Too bad no one trusts you

— MDR82 (@mattydr82) October 9, 2025

I’ve never heard of a security feature that was a bar code… but ok, whatever you say, AIPAC….

— ashley (@achaiken13) October 9, 2025

Senior Staff Writer
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Originally from New York, Powers graduated from New York University and eventually made her way to sunny South Florida where she has been writing for the BizPacReview team since 2015.

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