On Friday, December 1st, Representative George Santos of New York was removed from Congress after less than a year of serving following a slew of charges and conspiracies brought against him.
From stealing people’s identities and making charges on his own campaign donors’ credit cards without their authorization, lying to the Federal Election Commission and the public about the financial state of his campaign, the reason for Santo’s removal held precedent.
As well as these charges, Santos falsely inflated the campaign’s reported receipts with non-existent loans and contributions that were either fabricated or stolen. He was then officially charged with one count of conspiracy to commit offenses against the United States, two counts of wire fraud, two counts of making materially false statements to the FEC, two counts of falsifying records submitted to obstruct the FEC, two counts of aggravated identity theft, and one count of access device fraud, in addition to the seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, and one count of theft of public funds, he also racked up another two counts of making materially false statements to the United States House of Representatives.
Though Santos has pleaded not-guilty, the 23 felony counts against him speaks more than anything. Alongside his legal charges, Santos has also been caught in various lies and controversies throughout his career. Just to name a few, Santos allegedly lied to donors, then used their money to make purchases at Hermes and an adult content website, used his campaign money for personal travel and botox, allegedly swindled a disabled vet whose dog was dying, said his mother died in the 9/11 attacks even though she passed away in 2016 and was living in Brazil as a nurse at the time of the attacks, said his grandparents were Ukrainian and Jewish Holocaust survivors, though his genealogy has no connections to the Holocaust at all, said his niece was kidnapped, he has denied his career as a drag queen in Brazil, and claimed he was on Hannah Montana.
Surprisingly, this list barely scraped the surface of the immense number of other white lies Santos has told. Since being removed from Congress, Santos has gained popularity from young people on social media for his almost comical behavior. Santos has resorted to making a living off of the Cameo app, sending personalized videos to his fans singing Taylor Swift songs and saying whatever absurd things his fans request to him.
Surprisingly, he has reportedly made six figures by filming these videos just within the past month, surpassing the congressional salary he was once paid. The New York Times has also announced that there is a George Santos Documentary coming soon from filmmaker Jenner Furst, who aims to focus on the human side of Santos’s story, his childhood, insecurities, heartbreaks and betrayals.
Though ultimately Santos’s political career is likely over for good, there will undoubtedly be more content coming from Santos in the future.
