Former Congressman George Santos

In Nov. 2022, two years after he lost his first campaign for Congress, gay Republican George Santos was the surprise winner in the race for the congressional seat representing New York’s 3rd Congressional District, making history by coming out on top in the first general election congressional contest between two openly LGBTQ candidates. But even before he was declared the winner, questions about his background and his finances had begun to surface.
The month before, September 2022, Long Island newspaper The North Shore Leader had begun to raise questions about Santos’ finances, after his personal financial disclosure report claimed assets totaling $11 million, significantly more than his net worth as declared in his 2020 congressional campaign.

The same month he won election, Santos’ lies started building up. First he told the Republican Jewish Coalition that his election meant there would be three Jewish Republicans in Congress (he is actually Catholic), then he told WNYC that he “lost four employees” in the 2016 massacre at Pulse nightclub in Orlando (none of the Pulse victims ever worked for or with him).

Then came the New York Times’ bombshell investigative report exposing even more of his lies: officials with both Baruch College and New York University say Santos never attended either school, much less graduated from them, and officials with both Citigroup and Goldman Sachs told the Times they had no records of Santos ever working for either company. By the end of the month, The Forward had published reports debunking Santos’ claim that his grandparents “fled persecution” in World War II as well as his claims to Jewish ancestry.

By the end of December, the New York attorney general’s office had announced it was “looking into a number of issues” regarding Santos. Santos then admitted he had “embellished” his resumé, but denied ever having committed any crime. On Dec. 28, the Nassau County DA’s office opened an investigation into the not-yet-even-sworn-in congressman.

As the 2023 new year dawned, officials in Brazil announced they would be reviving fraud charges there against Santos related to a stolen checkbook. Then the Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission accusing Santos and his campaign of misusing campaign funds by paying personal expenses and concealing the origins of a loan he made to his own campaign. Before he had even made it a month in Congress, complaints were filed with the House Ethics Committee and some of his colleagues called for Santos to resign.

As the days passed, more evidence of Santos’ many lies surfaced (his mother was not even in the U.S. on 9/11) and complaints alleging financial crimes continued to pile up. A Brazilian drag queen released photos she claimed showed Santos in drag there. Then came February and a bombshell report from ABC News, in which “multiple men” described relationships with Santos, some of which happened when the men were still teenagers and in which Santos lied to try and manipulate and trap them. Santos “temporarily” stepped down from his two committee appointments before refusing calls to resign.

On May 10, Santos was arrested by federal authorities who unsealed a 13-count indictment charging him with wire fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds and lying to Congress. He continued to deny the charges and to resist calls that he resign from Congress, then in October, federal prosecutors in Long Island issued a superseding indictment that added 23 charges to those already leveled against Santos.

By then, even some Republicans were insisting he resign, although their resolution in October to expel Santos failed. Then came the final blow: On Nov. 16, the House Ethics Committee issued the findings from its investigation, declaring that there was significant evidence that the gay Republican from Long Island had committed numerous federal crimes. Santos announced he would not run for re-election, but his colleagues in both parties, acting on a resolution by the Republican chair of the House Ethics Committee, on Dec. 1 voted 311-114 to toss Santos out immediately.

And, just as his election the year before had made history, Santos against made history as only the sixth time that a member of Congress had been expelled. With 23 federal charges against him looming, it seems safe to say the Santos story will continue into 2024.

— Tammye Nash