U.S. Rep. George Santos this week said he could prove his innocence after federal prosecutors added 23 counts to criminal charges he was already facing. Santos also dismissed efforts to expel him from Congress, declaring, “I pity the fools” that try to get him tossed from the House.
Gay Republican George Santos, who allegedly lied his way into a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in the November 2022 elections, this week found himself facing even more criminal charges and an effort by some of his GOP colleagues in the House to have him expelled from Congress, according to reports by Politico and other sources, including ABC News.
Santos, who represents New York’s 3rd District had already been indicted in May on 13 criminal counts — seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, two counts of making materially false statements to the House of Representatives and one count of theft of public funds.
This week, federal prosecutors in Long Island added 23 more counts in a superseding indictment charging Santos with “two counts of wire fraud, two counts of making materially false statements to the Federal Election Commission, two counts of falsifying records submitted to obstruct the FEC, two counts of aggravated identity theft and one count of access device fraud,” according to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York.
Breon Peace, U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said the new charges include “stealing people’s identities and making charges on his own donors’ credit cards without their authorization, lying to the FEC and, by extension, the public about the financial state of his campaign. Santos falsely inflated the campaign’s reported receipts with non-existent loans and contributions that were either fabricated or stolen.”
Peace pledged that their office will “relentlessly pursue criminal charges against anyone who uses the electoral process as an opportunity to defraud the public and our government institutions.”
In light of the new charges, five House Republicans from New York said Wednesday, Oct. 11, that they are sponsoring a resolution to expel Santos from Congress. The resolution comes just five months after these five representatives joined other House Republicans to vote down an effort to expel Santos and is said to be an effort by the five to protect their seats as they are expected to face tough re-election races next year.
The five are Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who represents a Long Island district neighboring Santos,and Reps. Nick LaLota, Mike Lawler, Marc Molinaro, Brandon Williams and Nick Langworthy.
The new charges and the resolution to expel come a week after Santos’ former campaign treasurer pleaded guilty to filing false campaign finance reports for Santos.
Santos said this week he can prove his innocence on all charges and that he is not concerned about efforts to expel him from Congress. In fact, channeling Mr. T, Santos declared, “They can try to expel me, but I pity the fools that go ahead and do that and think that that’s the smartest idea.”
