UPDATE 3:00 P.M. PST: Well! George Santos may actually face consequences after all!
The newly elected Representative for New York’s 3rd District lied about his education, job, property, ethnic background, and who knows what else?? It’s already become clear House Republicans aren’t going to punish him in any way. But it looks like there will be a criminal investigation at least!
Nassau District Attorney Anne T. Donnelly told People on Wednesday:
“The numerous fabrications and inconsistencies associated with Congressman-Elect Santos are nothing short of stunning. The residents of Nassau County and other parts of the third district must have an honest and accountable representative in Congress. No one is above the law and if a crime was committed in this county, we will prosecute it.”
That’s a big IF she threw in there. There are lots of lies, that’s provably true. But is lying a crime? Does it count as fraud — the legal term fraud, not just generally — if he misrepresented himself just to get elected? Something tells us if we start prosecuting broken campaign promises, the jails won’t have enough room…
But there is the matter of campaign finance. Like we said, follow that money. This is a man who lied about how he made his money — and yet had $700,000 in very real bucks to contribute to his own campaign? With all the other lies, we have to expect something he lied about will turn out to be illegal. Because as bad a precedent as prosecuting him for lying might set… wouldn’t it be a worse precedent to let him go join Congress??
How in the hell did this happen?!
OK, imagine this… You agree to go on a date with a guy based on his dating site profile. Then you find out he lied about his job, his education, how much money he had, where he lives, his ethnicity, possibly even his sexual orientation. Would you even go on a second date with that man?! HELL NO! You’d be texting your friend to make that emergency call to get you the hell out of there ASAP!
Alright, now that we’ve got that settled… What if that’s what happened with the guy you voted for??
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After winning his election to Congress in New York, George Santos was revealed to have lied about ALL that. A New York Times exposé revealed the following claims were all false:
- he worked for Goldman Sachs and Citigroup (he never worked for either)
- he had degrees from NYU and Baruch College (he never went to college)
- he was so successful as a businessman that he owned 13 properties (he actually doesn’t even own a home of his own — he lives with his sister)
He even claimed to be Jewish, which is also not true. Oddest of all, he claims to be the first openly gay non-incumbent Republican elected to the House of Representatives. But another bombshell report found he had been married to a woman right up until 2020 when he first started running for Congress. It’s not unheard of, obviously, for a gay man to hide his identity, even from himself — or even to be married to a woman. And there’s no way anyone can prove that’s not true. But in the context of learning he lied about literally everything else, it’s pretty sus.
OK, so on Monday night Santos did the unthinkable — he confirmed ALL OF THIS! He’s been lying, and he’s basically giving himself a slap on the wrist for it. He told the New York Post:
“My sins here are embellishing my resume. I’m sorry.”
EMBELLISHING?? He’s serious with this??
He actually told the outlet he will still be “effective” as a Congressman because he always had his constituents’ best interests at heart. But come on! He doesn’t even trust them enough to tell them the truth! He maintained:
“I campaigned talking about the people’s concerns, not my resume… The people elected me to fight for them.”
But they didn’t elect you! They elected some guy you pretended to be!
He’s seriously not even taking responsibility, calling the Wall Street jobs lie a “poor choice of words,” clarifying that he works with a company that has done business with Goldman Sachs and CitiGroup. Seriously?!
Related: Feds Request 10 Years For Jen Shah’s Fraud Scheme
What about lying about being Jewish?! He told pro-Israel groups he was “a proud American Jew” and claimed his grandparents were Holocaust survivors — something which has turned out not to be true. You will not believe this. He says:
“I never claimed to be Jewish. I am Catholic. Because I learned my maternal family had a Jewish background I said I was ‘Jew-ish.'”
Wow. Just wow. This is some sitcom-level obfuscation. Just unbelievable. Literally.
There’s also the reporting in the NY Times that a man with Santos’ name and birthdate was arrested for stealing and using a dead man’s checkbook. That man was potentially facing some serious prison time — but disappeared before he could be prosecuted. Is this the same man? It really seems like it…
Santos denies he’s ever been charged with a crime, but at this point… how can you trust what he says about, well, anything??
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But it isn’t as simple as a guy lying about everything and not getting caught until it was too late. There’s a big mystery still to unravel. See, everything about his jobs may have been false… but there’s a very REAL sum of cash here. See, he apparently was still only making $55k/year in 2020, according to his taxes. But all of a sudden this year he reported having $11 million! You’d assume that’s a lie like the rest of it, like the properties and the jobs… However, he was able to file a contribution of nearly $700,000 out of his own pocket to his account. That money was REAL. It’s not like his ship suddenly came in — remember, all that stuff about being a wealthy Wall Street guy is B.S. So where did the money come from?? Who paid for this seat in Congress??
This is probably the biggest reason we can’t just let randos con their way into politics. Imagine a foreign power wanted to get someone into our legislature. They couldn’t use a foreign spy… but they could buy an US citizen’s way in. It would have to be an American with absolutely zero integrity or compunction about lying, but… those clearly exist.
We know, it sounds like a ridiculous movie plot, but frankly… so does ALL of this.
But maybe the most effed up part?? According to the Post, this lying liar’s opponent may not have figured any of this out in time to use it in a debate — but the House Republicans knew all about it! The outlet says multiple insiders “close to House GOP leadership” confirmed they’ve known about it for months! A senior GOP leadership aide said:
“As far as questions about George in general, that was always something that was brought up whenever we talked about this raceIt was a running joke at a certain point. This is the second time he’s run and these issues we assumed would be worked out by the voters.”
Except… the voters didn’t know. They expect people running for Congress to be vetted by… well, SOMEONE!
So what happens now? Well, the Republicans will have control of the House, and since they already knew and didn’t care… it seems like this fraud is about to become the first openly bulls**t US Congressman. But the investigation will continue, too. How much crazier will it get? Guess we’ll find out…
[Image via City&State/Disney/YouTube.]