FABRICATED BIOGRAPHY
Santos has been mired in controversy since his November 2022 election. He has admitted fabricating a lot of his biography, and federal prosecutors accuse him of laundering marketing campaign funds and defrauding donors. Santos has pleaded not responsible to these prices.
He survived a earlier expulsion try in early November, when 182 of his fellow Republicans and 31 Democrats voted in opposition to eradicating him on the grounds that his felony case ought to be resolved first.
However a subsequent, scathing Home Ethics Committee report on Santos’ behaviour eroded what help he had. Solely 112 of 222 Home Republicans voted to maintain him in workplace this time round. Two Democrats voted in opposition to expulsion.
“George Santos’ lies had been designed to defraud and deceive the voters to ensure that him to be elected, not like different public corruption circumstances,” Consultant Dan Goldman, a New York Democrat and former federal prosecutor, instructed reporters shortly earlier than the vote.
A bipartisan congressional investigation final month discovered that Santos charged nearly US$4,000 for spa therapies, together with Botox, to his congressional marketing campaign account. He additionally spent greater than US$4,000 of marketing campaign cash at luxurious retailer Hermes and made “smaller purchases” from OnlyFans, an internet platform recognized for sexual content material, based on the Ethics Committee.
Following the Ethics Committee report, he stated he wouldn’t run for reelection subsequent 12 months.
The final expulsion was in 2002: Democrat James Traficant of Ohio in 2002, following his felony corruption conviction.
Santos’ troubles started shortly after his November 2022 election, when media retailers reported he had not really attended New York College or labored at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, as he had claimed throughout his marketing campaign.
He additionally falsely claimed Jewish heritage and instructed voters his grandparents had fled the Nazis throughout World Conflict II.
Studies of the falsehoods made Santos a pariah within the Home and the butt of late-night TV comedians even earlier than federal prosecutors charged him with an array of fraud and campaign-finance crimes.
In a 23-count indictment, they accuse him of inflating his fundraising totals with a purpose to draw extra help from the Republican Get together, laundering funds to pay for private bills, and charging donors’ credit playing cards with out permission.
Two former marketing campaign aides have pleaded responsible to associated fraud prices.
Santos denies wrongdoing, and his trial is scheduled to start on Sep 9, 2024, shortly earlier than the November elections that can decide management of the White Home and each chambers of Congress.
Earlier than Santos’ win in 2022, the district was represented by Democrat Tom Suozzi, who unsuccessfully ran for governor. Suozzi and 19 different candidates, together with eight Republicans, have filed to run for Santos’ seat.