Newly Elected Republican Lied about his entire life

Page 5 of 8 [ 122 posts ]  Go to page Previous  1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8  Next

goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

19 Jan 2023, 1:49 pm

Obvi this guy is a total fraud. Hopefully he made some campaign finance errors that get him tossed/jailed.

The other major concerning thing pertaining to him is that many other republican politicians are either supporting him staying or turning a blind eye to him, for group power dynamics reasons.. but still, they should all lose a bunch of credibility for this charade.


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

19 Jan 2023, 2:30 pm

lol he had yet another name.. "Kitara Ravache," his drag queen name in Brazil:

https://www.salon.com/2023/01/19/george ... ng-photos/

Pics seem to match + the reputation as being a total liar. Same guy.


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

20 Jan 2023, 11:21 pm

Image


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


funeralxempire
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 27 Oct 2014
Age: 39
Gender: Non-binary
Posts: 25,184
Location: Right over your left shoulder

20 Jan 2023, 11:57 pm

I don't know how the Onion will cover this guy, he's already two steps ahead of them.


_________________
"If you stick a knife in my back 9 inches and pull it out 6 inches, there's no progress. If you pull it all the way out, that's not progress. The progress is healing the wound that the blow made... and they won't even admit the knife is there." Malcolm X
戦争ではなく戦争と戦う


Misslizard
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 18 Jun 2012
Age: 59
Gender: Female
Posts: 20,454
Location: Aux Arcs

21 Jan 2023, 12:11 am

He shot Kennedy 8O
Knows where Hoffa is.


_________________
I am the dust that dances in the light. - Rumi


cyberdad
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 21 Feb 2011
Age: 56
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,146

21 Jan 2023, 12:13 am

He also lives with Elvis Presley and helped the astronauts land on the moon.



ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

23 Jan 2023, 6:01 pm

Siena poll: Santos should resign
Behind a paywall

Quote:
Fifty-nine percent of New York voters said embattled Rep. George Santos should resign from Congress, according to a survey released Monday

The Siena College Research Institute poll found that voters who say Santos, a Republican, should resign include 49% of Republicans voters statewide. Just 17% of voters felt Santos shouldn’t resign.

More than half of liberals, conservatives and moderates said they had an unfavorable view of Santos, who began his term this month.

The poll found suburban voters — dominated by those on Long Island — had the harshest view of Santos with 76% giving him an unfavorable rating. Santos also was seen unfavorably by 45% of voters polled in New York City and 53% of those upstate.

Republicans and Democrats shared the same unfavorable view of Santos, with no statistical difference between voters of the two parties. There was also no statistical difference between the high disapproval rate of about 60% among Jewish, Catholic and Protestant voters.

The poll questioned 821 registered voters from Jan. 15 through Thursday. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.



Dems, GOP lining up potential candidates if Santos leaves his seat
Behind a paywall
Quote:
Republicans and Democrats are quietly working to identify and prepare candidates for a special election for the 3rd Congressional District should Rep. George Santos resign or be removed from Congress, according to members of both parties.

Should a special election ultimately be necessary, both sides agree it would be expensive and draw nationwide interest and money.

For Republicans, holding the seat is important for the slim GOP majority in the House of Representatives, and Speaker Kevin McCarthy of California would be expected to devote a substantial amount of cash and resources from the GOP congressional campaign committee to a special election.

Several potential Republican candidates are the subject of private talks and polling, party members say.

Whoever the Republicans choose, the party will have the added chore of dealing with the political damage caused by Santos, a conservative Republican endorsed by the party.

Veteran Democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf said that when seats are vacated by scandals, voters traditionally “blame the party for the embarrassment, rather than view candidates individually.”

For Democrats, the race would be a major test of new House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies of Brooklyn. He, too, would be expected to expend significant resources to retake the seat.

A Democratic win would “make Hakeem Jeffries an even bigger player because his people will be all over it,” Sheinkopf said. “It will be the first win for which he can take credit.”

Democrats confirm many candidates are interested in the seat.

Political analysts say the successful candidate would likely have to be a centrist, neither a Trump Republican nor a socialist Democrat. The enrollment shows there are 229,188 enrolled Democrats and 163,426 Republicans, but there are also 158,868 voters not enrolled in a party.

State records show 79% of the district’s voters are in Nassau and just under 21% in Queens.

“It’s a weird district,” said Steven Greenberg of the Siena College Research Institute poll. “It’s a district some would assume would be a safe Democratic seat, but it’s not. It’s a leaning-Democratic seat. To win, Democrats and Republicans are going to have to appeal to the middle.”


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman


ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

23 Jan 2023, 6:05 pm

He invented the vaccine that caused autism.


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman


ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

24 Jan 2023, 9:14 pm

Rep. George Santos now says $500K campaign loan wasn’t ‘personal

Quote:
Disgraced Rep. George Santos (R-NY) is backpedaling on a previous claim that he loaned his campaign hundreds of thousands of dollars in personal funds, Tuesday filings with the Federal Election Commission show.

The lying Long Islander isn’t telling the government where the six-figure loan came from, only that it didn’t come from his private nest egg, according to the amended filings first reported by The Daily Beast.

Santos’ political team amended hundreds of pages of campaign finance reports. On one page of the new filings related to the $500,000 loan, the box indicating the money was the “personal funds of the candidate” was unchecked. The former filing from September 2022 had the box checked for the loan. Both old and new filings claim the loan came “from the candidate.”

Santos also disclosed Tuesday that a separate $125,000 “loan from the candidate” was not from “personal funds,” but did not shed light on where the money came from or when the loan is due.


George Santos claims he survived ‘assassination attempt,’ had shoes stolen off his feet
Quote:
Rep. George Santos, the chronically untruthful Long Island Republican who has fabricated much of his biography, claimed in a newly unearthed podcast interview that he survived an “assassination attempt” — and separately had his shoes stolen off his feet during a mugging in the middle of Fifth Avenue.

The notorious fabulist made a series of wild allegations during a virtual sit-down with a Brazilian podcast in December, which was translated from Portuguese by MSNBC’s “The Rachel Maddow Show” and aired on Monday.

“We have already suffered an attempt on my life, an assassination attempt, a threatening letter, having to have the police, a police escort standing in front of our house,” said Santos, who previously went by the name Anthony Devolder and was introduced on the show as George Santos-Devolder.

The freshman congressman, who is of Brazilian descent — but previously claimed he was “Jew-ish” and the descendant of Holocaust survivors — alleged that he has been the victim of multiple crimes over the years, including the “assassination attempt.”

He also said that when he and his husband returned home from a New Year’s Eve party in 2021, they found their Florida home vandalized in what he described as a politically motivated attack.

“It was vandalized because we were at a Republican party,” he argued.

Later in the interview, Santos recounted how one afternoon in the summer of 2021, he was mugged by two men in the middle of Fifth Avenue in New York City.

“Before asking any questions, they (the robbers) weren’t black, they were even white, but they robbed me, took my briefcase, took my shoes, and my watch,” Santos said on the podcast. “And that was in broad daylight. It was 3 p.m. I was leaving my office, going to the garage, getting my car, and I was mugged.

Maddow said during Monday night’s broadcast that the hosts of the Brazilian podcast later asked Santos — aka Devolder — for a copy of a police report documenting his purported robbery but did not receive a response.


George Santos shares photos to back up sketchy claims of early COVID-19 hospitalization: report
Quote:
Truth-challenged Long Island Rep. George Santos on Tuesday defended his claims that he was hospitalized with a severe early case of COVID-19 during the first weeks of the pandemic by presenting photographic evidence.

The 34-year-old congressman has dramatically recounted his bout with the virus multiple times, although the timeline and severity have varied over the years, drawing skepticism given his penchant for fabrication.

Santos provided photos to Semafor of himself sick in a Queens hospital bed. He also sent a screenshot of his positive test results.

Both photos include dates that show March 11, which fits roughly into his timeline. Labcorp began testing for COVID-19 on March 5, the report said.

Semafor noted that March 11 is the date that Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson announced they had tested positive for the virus, the NBA announced it was shutting down the league and the stock market nosedived. Very few positive tests were recorded at the time.

On March 30, 2020, Santos told the “Empire State Conservative Podcast” that he had been taken to Elmhurst Hospital in an ambulance with COVID-19 symptoms earlier that month after possibly being exposed to the virus at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Feb. 29. The photos he provided to Semafor includes a location stamp of the hospital.

“Unfortunately, on the 9th of March I became symptomatic with what we all know now very well, COVID-19 aka coronavirus or commonly known as the Chinese flu,” he said, while laughing. “On the 11th I ended up in the hospital. It was really bad, fever, body aches, you know, all the known symptoms there.”

He told the podcast that he ran a temperature of 102.5 for five days and said he suffered from hallucinations. Santos also claimed the situation was especially dangerous because he had pre-existing medical conditions and was recovering from a brain tumor.

“I have an immunodeficiency and I have acute chronic bronchitis. I also battled a brain tumor a couple of years ago, and I had radiation done, which really lowers your immunity in general,” he said. “Radiation isn’t a game. I’m susceptible to cancer. It’s in my DNA.”

Four days after he said he tested positive and was extremely sick, the rookie congressman — who was running to represent New York’s 3rd Congressional District at the time — appeared virtually on FOX Business on March 18, looking spry and well-fed-looking discussing his recovery and how he was no longer symptomatic.

The next month, however, Santos said during a COVID-19 virtual town hall that he was still suffering from the virus through the date of his TV appearance.

In September 2020, he told the Island Now outlet that he had suffered “the worst two weeks of my life as an adult” during his supposed illness.

In an interview with Fox News that October, Santos claimed he had gotten the virus on “March 7,” not March 9 as he said before.

If that were true, Santos would have been among the first 11 patients in New York City.

Santos told Semafor he became symptomatic on March 7 before he was finally admitted to the hospital and placed in isolation. He declined to address questions about a brain tumor, telling the news outlet he was not yet ready to discuss his “whole medical record.”

His claims of having a brain tumor were repeated during his unsuccessful bid for Congress in 2020 and his successful campaign last year, the Daily Beast reported.


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

24 Jan 2023, 9:37 pm

:lol: :roll: Just stfu, resign & disappear.. better than the likely alternative, which is ending up in jail whether in the USA or Brazil.


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

26 Jan 2023, 10:45 pm

George Santos Says He Has a New Treasurer. The Treasurer Does Not Agree.

Quote:
Representative George Santos’s campaign and six affiliated political committees filed statements on Wednesday indicating they were removing his longtime treasurer, Nancy Marks, who has been connected to nearly every Santos-related fund and one of Mr. Santos’s private business ventures.

But the move — as with so many things regarding Mr. Santos, who has admitted to falsehoods on the campaign trail and misleading statements about his background — was clouded by mystery and immediately provoked questions.

Shortly after the first new filings surfaced, Ms. Marks’s apparent replacement as treasurer, Thomas Datwyler, said through a representative that he had not agreed to the swap and suggested that the changes were made without his consent.

“On Monday, we informed the Santos campaign that Mr. Datwyler would not be taking over as treasurer,” Mr. Datwyler’s lawyer, Derek Ross, said. “And there appears to be some disconnect between that conversation and this filing.”

Mr. Santos, a Republican from New York, and his team provided no explanation. His lawyer, Joe Murray, said, “I have no response to any of that.” Ms. Marks did not immediately respond to an email or phone calls seeking comment.

On Tuesday, Mr. Santos’s campaign filed updated reports that raised new questions about the source of $705,000 that Mr. Santos lent his congressional campaign. The crux of the issue revolved around two unchecked boxes denoting whether two of the larger loans came from his personal funds.

Earlier this month, the Campaign Legal Center, a watchdog group, filed a complaint with the F.E.C. asking it to investigate whether Mr. Santos improperly spent campaign money on personal expenses or obscured the true sources of his campaign funding.

The complaint has put Ms. Marks, who has been a key member of Mr. Santos’s political circle since he first ran for office, under greater scrutiny. In addition to her work with Mr. Santos, she was the treasurer for former Representative Lee Zeldin’s campaign for governor and has been tied to other companies that offered services to Republican candidates in New York.



George Santos Cracked Appalling Hitler Joke About Killing Jews: Report
Quote:
Rep. George Santos (R-NY), who said he was “Jew-ish” and falsely claimed that his grandparents were forced to flee the Holocaust, joked about Hitler and the killing of Jews of Black people in a 2011 Facebook comment, according to a Thursday report from Patch. Santos’ comment was apparently left under a friend’s post that showed “someone making what appears to be a military salute with the caption ‘something like Hitler,’” the outlet reported. “hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh hiiiiiiiiiiiitlerrrrrrrrrrr (hight hitler) lolololololololololololol sombody kill her!!” Santos reportedly wrote. “the jews and black mostly lolllolol!! ! Dum.” A former friend told Patch that they’d screenshotted the offensive comment at the time, while Santos’ onetime roommate, Gregory Morey-Parker, verified to the outlet that the original Facebook post existed. Morey-Parker also said that Santos would regularly make antisemitic comments, “but he brushed it off saying he was Jewish. He’d always say that it was okay for him to make those jokes because he was Jewish.”


Usually, I don't judge people by a really bad joke posted a dozen years ago but Santos deserves no slack.


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

27 Jan 2023, 6:30 am

https://fb.watch/ijrHMjbBAP/?mibextid=v7YzmG


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

30 Jan 2023, 3:44 pm

Lawyer commentators said there’s a DOJ investigation into his campaign financing of $700k in loans he said were personal then weren’t etc etc and apparently this is pretty serious and may get him kicked out of congress. 8)


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

30 Jan 2023, 7:30 pm

Major George Santos donors say they were 'misled' and 'defrauded'
Behind a paywall

Quote:
Major Long Island donors to the congressional campaign of George Santos, including prominent wealth managers, investors and the chairman of Nassau County's only public hospital, said they were "misled" and "defrauded" by Santos' fundraising appeals, and some want their money back.

More than a half-dozen prominent local business leaders, speaking publicly for the first time, told Newsday they were deceived by the candidate and presumed, incorrectly, that Republican Party leaders had scrutinized his record and background.

The donors contacted last week said revelations over the past month that Santos lied on his resume, and fabricated stories about his educational, work and ethnic backgrounds, had caused them to question information he gave them when he was soliciting contributions.

"Of course we feel lied to and betrayed,” Iris Maidenbaum, of Lawrence, told Newsday. Her husband, Shalom Maidenbaum, runs Maidenbaum Property Tax Reduction Group, a major tax-challenge company.

Santos raised $5.5 million over the election cycle — $1.2 million of which came from Nassau and Suffolk County residents, the Newsday analysis show

Matthew Bruderman, a Centre Island financier and chairman of the board that runs Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow; his wife, Kerri Beth; and their son, Trevor, contributed a total of nearly $75,000 to committees tied to Santos, a Newsday analysis of Federal Election Commission and New York State Board of Elections filings shows.

A Bruderman attorney, who declined to be identified, said in a statement that Bruderman and his family were “fraudulently induced” to support Santos, and have formally requested refunds of their contributions.

Bruderman, who also was a major supporter of the Nassau County Republican Committee and Republican Lee Zeldin’s unsuccessful campaign for governor last year, “believes strongly that this kind of deceit is deplorable, undermines public trust in our institutions and Mr. Santos should have no place in public life,” the statement said.

Newsday reached out to more than two dozen contributors after developing a list of Long Island ZIP codes associated with donations to Santos’ primary congressional campaign committee, his federal leadership committee, a joint fundraising committee with the Nassau Republican Committee and a state political action committee run by his sister, Tiffany Santos.

Nine donors responded in interviews or statements.

They included Robert Mangi, an insurance executive who contributed nearly $200,000 to the Santos and Nassau committees, and Dr. Jeff Vacirca, who heads a prominent Suffolk-based oncology practice and contributed nearly $50,000.

Vacirca and Todd O’Connell, the practice's president, donated a total of nearly $100,000 to PACs tied to Santos, according to FEC data.

After reading news reports of extensive falsehoods in Santos' work and education history, Vacirca in a Newsday story last week said of Santos: “I have to say, one of the best con men I’ve ever met. It’s embarrassing to admit being taken in by someone like him.”

The Newsday analysis highlights the success of Santos, then a little-known congressional candidate with roots in Queens, in tapping a network of influential Nassau and Suffolk residents, many of whom give regularly to candidates for office.

Now, many say they feel burned.

"More than the personal humiliation of finding the person you thought was a 'Next Gen' political standard bearer is, in fact, a fraud is the realization that these stunning revelations come with significant collateral damage," Mangi, a Lloyd Harbor resident, said in a statement to Newsday.

Mangi, who runs Garden City-based Northeast Coverages, a wholesale insurance broker, and his wife, Sandra, contributed a total of $197,400 to Santos-tied committees, state and federal records show.

That includes a $150,000 donation Robert Mangi made to Tiffany Santos’ Rise NY PAC on Sept. 10, 2021, FEC filings show.

Mangi didn't address how he met Santos.

But he called his experience "a cautionary tale for everyone, regardless of enrollment, ideology, or their level of campaign support … It will surely have a chilling effect across the political spectrum."

Steve Israel, a Democrat who served in Congress for 16 years, including four years in the 3rd District, said of donors in districts such as Santos': "These are people who know how to make a deal, and how not to be swindled, you would think. They're not easy marks."

Israel, who led the House Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee from 2011-15, said, "my own experience with donors, who were sophisticated and affluent, was that they really knew their stuff. You had to make a convincing case. They weren't easy. You know, they didn't fall prey to sound bites."

Israel, director of the nonpartisan Institute of Politics and Global Affairs at Cornell University and the owner of Theodore's Books in Oyster Bay, continued: "How they fell prey to this guy's [Santos'] lies is part of the mystery."

Neil Malhotra is a professor of political economy at the Stanford Graduate School of Business who has written about the mentality of “elite donors.”

Such contributors often are concerned about national issues, he said, and many knew control of the House of Representatives in 2022 could hinge on the outcome of competitive races on Long Island, where there were three open seats, including in the 3rd District.

Regardless of their motivation, those who fall prey to unscrupulous candidates risk possible reputational damage given that the public can access their contributions online, Malhotra said.

“And if you gave to somebody who's a con man, it reflects on your judgment,” Malhotra said.

Many elite donors also give money to candidates in the hopes of gaining access to them on particular issues once they're elected, Stanley Renshon, a political science professor at The CUNY Graduate Center, told Newsday.

“They know they’re buying a hearing,” Renshon said.

If an elected official is exposed as a fraud and ostracized, such access no longer is worth much, Renshon said.

For donors who backed such candidates, "there’s a certain amount of embarrassment," in telling associates or friends, "‘Oh, I talked to him and you know, He’s going to do X, Y and Z.’ ”

Iris Maidenbaum, while not a 3rd District resident, said Santos' refusal to resign was hurting his constituents.

“They believed in him and he’s representing them,” Maidenbaum said. “The whole thing, in a word if you wanted to sum it up, is bizarre."

I don't feel sorry for them. What was known is that he said he was at the insurrection and they still gave to him so f**k them.



In George Santos' district, local officials turn elsewhere for help
Behind a paywall
Quote:
For two of Long Island’s three freshman congressmen, it’s been a busy January of appointments and phone calls and schmoozing with local officials back home.

In the easternmost congressional district, the office of new Rep. Nick LaLota (R-Amityville) has discussed the Asharoken sea wall, Riverhead Town Square, Middle Country Road revitalization and the dredging of Northport Harbor, said his spokeswoman Lauren Lembo.

In the district covering the southern half of Nassau County, there have been discussions involving the office of new Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-Island Park) about flood-mitigating sea gates in Freeport and coastal resiliency in Island Park and Long Beach, with a planned discussion about the Bay Park Conveyance Project, said his spokesman Matt Capp.

In the Island’s westernmost district, new Rep. George Santos (R-Nassau/Queens) has been busy, too.

But just barely, if at all, with the needs of local government officials, according to interviews with Newsday and a review of Santos' Twitter accounts.

He’s apparently made few if any known inroads with the local officials who run the dozens of towns, villages, cities and other government entities in the chunk of Nassau and sliver of eastern Queens he represents.

Just as the 750,000 or so constituents in each of America's 435 congressional districts can seek out their local member of Congress to help with immigration issues, veterans affairs, admission to military academies and more, governments look to that same politician to act as a key liaison to the federal bureaucracy: unlocking grant money, untangling red tape and bringing home the proverbial bacon.

“I have not heard a word from George Santos,” said Glen Cove Mayor Pamela Panzenbeck, a fellow Republican. She said she's turning to other members of Congress to address the city’s federal needs — repaving roads, rehabbing parking garages, fixing water mains to avert emergency shutdowns, and more.

“George Santos is busy making a fool out of himself. Not looking to help me or anybody, as far as I’m concerned,” she said.

Santos is the subject of several investigations by county, state and federal prosecutors, as well as an ethics complaint. Among the subjects being probed: his financial dealings and political fundraising activity. Each day seems to bring a new revelation about his past, character, temperament.

“We could really use substantive representation in Washington, D.C., which we are currently obviously not getting, and we don’t anticipate — or at least I don’t anticipate — that the current congressman will be able to do his job effectively with this hanging over his head. So it’s as if we are kind of in limbo now,” said Mineola’s mayor, Paul Pereira, a self-described independent, who said the village counts on the federal government to provide grants such as those that help ensure clean drinking water and improve mass transit.

Weeks after the revelations, about 30 fellow Republicans on Long Island announced they would refuse to work with Santos, suggesting his constituents turn elsewhere for help, such as to D’Esposito’s office.

North Hempstead Town Councilwoman Mariann Dalimonte, a Democrat who represents areas including Port Washington, the Plandome villages, Munsey Park and Flower Hill, said that she felt confident when seeking help from Santos' predecessor in the 3rd Congressional District, Democrat Thomas Suozzi. Issues included recovery from destruction wrought by Hurricane Ida in 2021, funding for construction at North Hempstead Beach Park and dropping oysters in Manhasset Bay to improve water quality.

“I just knew it was dealt with,” with appropriate follow-ups, even if not always successfully, she said.

That changed when Santos took office earlier this month, according to Dalimonte.

“I don’t have that anymore,” she said, “Now I have nobody. Who am I contacting? He doesn’t answer his phone"

Dalimonte has instead gone to the offices of New York’s two U.S. senators, Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, who have statewide jurisdiction to help any constituent or municipality.

“Let’s think about that: Gillibrand and Schumer, they represent the entire state. Could you imagine if their offices are now getting phone calls from everyone in Congressional District 3, because we don’t have an effective congressperson? That’s not fair to them. That’s not fair to us,” Dalimonte said.

Peter King, a Long Island congressman from 1993 until 2021, said he's never heard of a member of Congress with little to no relationship with officials back home. When King, a Republican, was in office, he said, a local municipality's staffer would speak with him or his office at least weekly.

“I mean, there’s always something going on,” King said in an interview, recalling how staff in his office would report: “‘Oh, I was talking to John Smith or Mary Jones yesterday from the city, or so-and-so called from Mineola. You know, somebody called us from the Town of Babylon or the Town of Islip.’”

Much of the work by congressional offices for localities back home goes on behind the scenes, by staff and the member. They acting as a liaison with an alphabet soup of federal agencies to address issues locally: Beach erosion. Superstorm Sandy. Post-9/11 security funding for police forces. MacArthur Airport.

And King had relationships not just with fellow Republicans, he said.

“I’m talking about Democrats now: Richie Schaffer, Steve Bellone, Bill de Blasio, Andrew Cuomo — they would call, their people would call,” he said.

Among the politicians also representing parts of Santos' district, one big name said he'd work with the congressman: New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a Democrat. Earlier this month, he answered “yes, yes, definitely” when asked whether he’d work with Santos.

“We’re going to need votes on the federal level, so until it is determined that he no longer should serve, right now, his name is congressman,” Adams said Jan. 12, “and we’re not leaving any stone unturned on who we should be sitting down with to make sure New Yorkers get resources that they need.”

But the mayor and his team have not met with the congressman and his aides, the mayor's press secretary, Fabien Levy, emailed last week.

And the mayor, in an interview with CBS/2 on Friday, appeared to have had enough.

"I think he should resign," Adams said.


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman


goldfish21
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 17 Feb 2013
Age: 41
Gender: Male
Posts: 22,490
Location: Vancouver, BC, Canada

31 Jan 2023, 3:47 am

ASPartOfMe wrote:
I don't feel sorry for them. What was known is that he said he was at the insurrection and they still gave to him so f**k them.

:lol: :heart: :lol: :heart: :lol: :heart:


_________________
No :heart: for supporting trump. Because doing so is deplorable.


ASPartOfMe
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 25 Aug 2013
Age: 66
Gender: Male
Posts: 34,242
Location: Long Island, New York

31 Jan 2023, 9:13 pm

Santos steps down from House panels amid ethics issues

Quote:
Republican Rep. George Santos of New York announced Tuesday he is temporarily stepping down from his two congressional committees, a move that comes amid a host of ethics issues and a day after he met with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

In a prepared statement, Santos said he wanted to focus on serving his constituents “without distraction.”

“I want to personally thank Speaker McCarthy for meeting with me to discuss the matter and allowing me to take time to properly clear my name before returning to my committees,” Santos said. “To my constituents, I remain committed to serving the district, and delivering results for both New York’s Third Congressional District and for the American people.”

Before issuing the statement, Santos addressed Republican lawmakers in a weekly closed-door meeting they have when in Washington. Rep. Tom Cole, R-Okla., said the decision was well-received from the GOP conference. “I think it was the appropriate thing to do and I was proud of him for getting up and doing this,” Cole said.

McCarthy met with Santos on Monday night but did not disclose their conversation.

“You’ll see,” McCarthy told reporters at the Capitol.


Close to 80 percent of voters in Santos’s district think he should step down: poll
Quote:
Nearly 80 percent of voters who live in embattled Rep. George Santos’s New York district want him to resign from Congress, according to a new survey that comes the same day the first-term Republican told colleagues he’d be stepping down from his committee assignments.

A Newsday/Siena College poll released on Tuesday, which questioned voters from New York’s 3rd Congressional District, found that 78 percent of respondents think Santos should resign, including 71 percent of Republicans, 72 percent of independents and 89 percent of Democrats.

Thirteen percent of respondents overall said they didn’t think the Long Island Republican should step down, while another 9 percent said they did not know or did not have an opinion.

Three-fourths of respondents said they did not think Santos could be an effective representative for his district, including 65 percent of Republicans, 74 percent of independents and 84 percent of Democrats.
And 71 percent of respondents said that Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was wrong to seat Santos on two congressional committees, including 59 percent of Republicans, 69 percent of independents and 82 percent of Democrats.

“Talk about buyers’ remorse. NY 3 voters elected George Santos by a comfortable margin not even three months ago. But today, the vast majority of his new constituents — including the vast majority of those who voted for him — want him gone,” Siena College Poll Director Don Levy said in a press release regarding the poll’s results.
“Discouragingly, three-quarters or more of voters of every party say that Santos’ behavior and now his refusing to resign show that our political system is broken, not that his behavior says little about the state of our politics.”

The Newsday/Siena College poll surveyed 653 residents from New York’s 3rd Congressional District Jan. 23-26. The margin of error is 4.4 percentage points.


Promised green cards, catfishing, threats: How George Santos' ex-boyfriends say they were left feeling trapped, manipulated
Quote:
As Rep. George Santos continues to face mounting scrutiny over fabricating large swaths of his biography, multiple men have described to ABC News past relationships with the New York congressman -- some allegedly occurring when they were still teenagers -- that they said turned toxic due to a flood of lies that Santos told to try to manipulate and trap them.

Several of the men ABC News spoke with said that they met Santos as young men, when Santos, who later ran for Congress as an openly gay Republican, was several years older than they were.

Leandro Bis said he was 19 years old when he met Santos at a bar in Manhattan in 2013, when Bis was in town from Brazil. Bis told ABC News in an interview that he knew the now-embattled congressman as Anthony Zabrovski, one of a handful of aliases that Santos has reportedly used over the years.

Bis said that over the next few weeks, he began a romantic relationship with Santos, who was 25 at the time. Bis recalled Santos telling him tales of dating supermodels and how they still begged him to become a model himself.

But Bis said he would later find out those claims were lies, and the relationship quickly turned "toxic" -- filled with what Bis said were "manipulative" things that Santos told him to keep him from leaving.

"He promised the world," Bis said of Santos, who Bis said at one point promised to marry him in order to help him secure U.S. citizenship.

"He promised me, 'Don't worry,' and that he will get me a green card if I marry him and stay under his 'wings,'" Bis recalled.

At the time, Bis said, he felt like Santos was trying to trap him.

"If you get a green card from him, you will be in his hands forever," Bis recalled thinking. "If you divorce, you had the leave the country."

Pedro Vilarva, who told ABC News he met Santos in 2014 on the dating app Tinder, said he shared an apartment with Santos' wife without knowing the two were married at the time. Santos encouraged Vilarva to move into the apartment with his then-wife, according to Vilarva, who said Santos would introduce her as his "friend."

Vilarva said that he and Santos started dating while Vilarva was still in high school. "He was 26 and I was 18," Vilarva said.

At the start of the relationship, Santos and Vilarva would spend the weekends together because Vilarva had his high school classes on weekdays, Vilarva said. The pair dated for about a year until Vilarva said the lies started to pile up.

Vilarva said he didn't find out about Santos' marriage until months into their relationship. At that point, Vilarva said, Santos proposed to him multiple times and promised him he would get a divorce. But the divorce would not come until years later, after the two had gone their separate ways.

Vilarva said the relationship ended after he started searching online for information on the multiple names he noticed Santos had used over the course of their relationship.

"The way that he is, is that he lies and then he tries to cover up that lie with another lie," Vilarva told ABC News.

Kevin Guzman, who says he met Santos over ten years ago, told ABC News that he was pursued romantically by Santos and that he ultimately declined Santos' advances.

But that didn't stop Santos from telling people they were dating, Guzman said.

Guzman remembers mutual friends asking him, "Oh, you're partners with Santos?" which shocked Guzman since they hadn't been romantically involved.

"He wanted me to be in a relationship with him, which I didn't want," Guzman told ABC News. "Then he made everybody think that I was with him."

A mutual friend, Yasser Rabello, corroborated Guzman 's account. Rabello, a former roommate of Santos, told ABC News that he remembered Santos lying about being in a relationship with Guzman.

"He hurt me a lot mentally," Guzman said. "If I hear his name, if I see a picture ... I was so scared of him."


_________________
Professionally Identified and joined WP August 26, 2013
DSM 5: Autism Spectrum Disorder, DSM IV: Aspergers Moderate Severity

“My autism is not a superpower. It also isn’t some kind of god-forsaken, endless fountain of suffering inflicted on my family. It’s just part of who I am as a person”. - Sara Luterman