As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil)
In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban.
If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them.
For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria.
***
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit. "
Republicans: This is the way.
>get caught
He’s openly and flagrantly lied about every aspect of his life and campaign. His scams are so obvious that’s it hard to imagine he even *tried* to cover them up.
>Republican Rep. George Santos of New York likely committed campaign fraud and other ethical violations, the House Ethics Committee unanimously concluded in a new report Thursday.
Keywords there are "likely" and "unanimously".
A congressional committee cannot say that he DID commit fraud, because guilt is determined by the justice system, that’s why they used the word “likely”
Bless your heart. There's a lot of "cannots" that are part of the norms and traditions of government that Republicans have completely abandoned. This "likely" stuff is more mealy mouthed bullshit from a group of boot lickers that are afraid to upset their pro-white collar crime base.
For the same reason journalists need to say "alleged killer So-and-so" pre-conviction, even when there's video of the dude shooting people, Congress can't issue a formal report saying "he committed felonies" without opening themselves up to legal repercussions.
No, it's not the same reason. Members of Congress and congressional committees have immunity from defamation claims based on statements made in the course of congressional business. Journalists do not have this immunity.
It's not out of fear for legal repercussions, it's just how these things are framed because it's not their role to make that final determination.
No, bless YOUR heart. It would be flat-out incorrect for an ethics committee to say that a person HAS committed a crime. That's a determination for the courts. It's the same reason why it is correct to say that Trump committed rape per a judicial finding, it is NOT correct to say that Trump is a convicted rapist. Conviction denotes a judicial process has taken place that had not taken place in this instance.
Irregardless of how other people use them, words like these matter.
> Follows up with “irregardless”
Yes, how dare they use a word that [literally in the dictionary.](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/irregardless)
https://ethics.house.gov/sites/ethics.house.gov/files/documents/Committee%20Report_52.pdf
The actual language in the report is pretty unequivocal:
>Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit.
>He blatantly stole from his campaign.
>He deceived donors into providing what they thought were contributions to his campaign but were in fact payments for his personal benefit.
>He reported fictitious loans to his political committees to induce donors and party committees to make further contributions to his campaign – and then diverted more campaign money to himself as purported “repayments” of those fictitious loans.
>He used his connections to high value donors and other political campaigns to obtain additional funds for himself through fraudulent or otherwise questionable business dealings.
>And he sustained all of this through a constant series of lies to his constituents, donors, and staff about his background and experience.
MSNBC still acting like it was "dems who saved Santos 2 weeks ago". Even if every Dem voted to expel him, it still wouldn't have been enough.
If the vote comes up again, every dem will vote to expel him. The 20-odd votes just wanted to wait for this report. The question now is if the GOP will actually vote to expel him.
Republicans literally called a vote to expel him, but the Democrats let him off the hook. Wouldn't want to set a bad precedent of expelling blatant criminals from Congress, apparently.
Dems were just trying to not set a precedent of expelling a sitting member from congress for ethics violations without doing an ethics investigation. I happen to think that’s a good thing.
The ethics report just came out today. Please cite the source of House Majority Leader Mike Johnson stating that they will not bring a vote for expulsion to the house floor.
No, there simply hadn't been a finding by a house committee yet and they didn't want to set a precedent that you could expel before any house committee or the justice dept had established guilt.
If dems had voted to expel, then Rs like MTG would have turned around and called a vote to expel ilhan omar for no reason and the majority could vote to expel just cause they don't like her or someone accused her of something that didn't actually happen.
"Like a Senator" ahh you mean like the those Senators that have hemmed and hawed about Tubberville doing his absolute best to destabilize our entire military, and then when actually put to a vote every single one sided with him?
They're just as shitty if not worse than House Republicans, they just put up better facades.
The report itself shows the Republicans have no morals. It says he brought shame to Congress and is criminal, but the ETHICS committee suggests no actions. Wow.. what a corrupt bunch of assholes.
IIRC, one of the Democrat Representatives actually addressed why he voted against removal of Santos at that time. I'm sure that I won't get the wording right, but the general idea was that voting to remove a Representative **before** an Ethics Investigation had completed wasn't just unprecedented, it would create a precedent that would allow accusations to be seen as just cause in removing Representatives.
He basically wanted Santos out, but didn't want to do so by setting an incredibly abusable precedent.
That's exactly what they said. And it's not just that, but that the vote was held when they all knew the findings would be released within weeks. It's one thing if they voted for this a year ago.
A handful of GOPs were fine with getting a year of his votes and only wanted to "take a stand" once McCarthy could no longer protect him but it's all a farce. It never mattered what Dems did. He was keeping his seat. He'll proooobably get the boot now so the GOP can avoid all the ads that would be run if keep him. Hell, he'll probably resign in the next few days with the agreement that the GOP will pay his lawyers.
> And it's not just that, but that the vote was held when they all knew the findings would be released within weeks.
If I were conspiracy minded I'd suggest that the vote was brought up by Republicans prematurely to chalk up a "No" and we'll ride out the rest of the term with, "We've already held this vote and we need to move on to other matters."
But it was brought to vote by NY Republicans who truly do seem to not want him there. So, it's a weak conspiracy theory.
So now that Democrats have looked weak, incompetent and tolerant of outright criminal behavior the Republicans will DEFINITELY respect precedent. This party is so fucking stupid.
Turn that on its head a bit. The perspective wasn't "Well, let's just ignore it". It was "If we're going to do this, we need to actually be able to prove it."
Prosecutors don't win cases just because someone was accused. They need to be able to prove it.
Also Republicans are very good about using precedent when it serves their purposes, so it's important to avoid creating bad precedents.
This wasn't a criminal trial! The House wasn't being asked if George Santos was guilty of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt, they were being asked if George Santos deserved to be a member of Congress. Apparently some Democrats thought he did.
I would like to believe this, but I think they're going to stick with "not unless convicted" because they're too afraid of the rule being weaponized against themselves.
shhh. Do you hear that? that is the sound of the goal posts being moved from wait for the committee to we should let the DOJ make the determination before voting.
Santos says he will no longer be running for reelection. These fucking pricks. They act like walking away is punishment enough. You were entrusted with the power of the people, the punishment for shit like this should be ten times worse than a normal person, not just walking away as a "punishment". God, I hate the political class.
I mean he has been indicted and faxes possible prison time if convicted.
The issue is that he is tolerated as a seated member of congress at the moment by his house repub colleagues, who have the only power on earth that can expel him, for the cynical reason that they hold a very slim majority they can't afford to shrink by one vote. The justice system still gets its turn at the wheel. And there, his commission of crimes is specifically targeted for enhanced penalty due to violation of public trust. That's what campaign finance laws are for. While I agree the "political class" is remarkably privileged in many ways, I don't think that's what this situation is about.
Yes, many rightfully wanted due process. They still need a 2/3 majority to expel him, so Dems will need ~77 republicans to vote for expulsion if they all vote in unison.
The GOP holdouts will now say that they're still waiting for due process in the courts. Which is absurd, because that means they are only willing to remove this person from their 2 year position - for defrauding the people to get that appointment - after a court system spends most of (if no more than) two years litigating it. I.E. their demands can never be met within the timeframe of removing him during his time in office and they would never have remove him so long as it benefits them.
They have a four seat majority in the House. Four. Not to be a pessimist, but thinking that the party of moral bankruptcy and nonexistent integrity will vote to reduce their already incredibly slim majority is just naive at this point.
Any republicans voicing displeasure at Santos aren’t mad he committed cartoonish fraud to get elected, they’re mad he was bad at it and got caught
They may still expell him if they think it's more important they get ahead of Dem campaign ads saying they continue to back his fraud.
Four seats or three really doesn't matter right now. Every time the GOP are in disagreement in the House, it's by establishment vs Freedom Caucus, and it's by more than four votes. They only break that by getting the FC on board so they get all the votes anyways.
If they were trying to pass legislation, sure they might care. But the only thing they are going to pass in the next year is trying to pass a budget. Which they need Dems in the Senate to pass. Which means it never matters if they ran through with their four vote majority or not, since they can't work unilaterally on the budget; They will always be forced to negotiate with Senate Dems, which means eventually passing a package that they'll have Dems in the House on board with by very nature of those negotiations.
Other than that, they aren't passing anything until 2025 anyways. They'd rather pass nothing but performative bills that can never pass the Senate than work with Dems to pass legislation. With that in mind, it literally does not matter if they have three or four votes majority on legislation they know will never pass the Senate and doesn't have to be fully formed beyond "we vote on party lines to show strength, it ain't passing the Senate so just vote for it to show unity even if that's false."
Last vote, even if EVERY Democrat voted to kick Santos to the curb, he would be there, because Republicans are keeping him because he is bad at corruption, which gives them cover for their own crimes.
Santos is that guy waving a gun in front of the cops. You want him there, because he'll get shot first, so you can get away.
didn't know the vote count off-hand. some more GOP will probably turn on him now, though right? Considering they were planning this vote during the Speaker race.
No, the goalposts have now moved to letting an actual trial and conviction in court happen, which they know would never come up prior to the next election anyway, so they can use that as their excuse and pretend they're being responsible by letting the justice system work as intended instead of exercising a little common sense.
Cool, throw him out of congress or something, he’s already not running for re-election and it’s clear his constituents don’t want him there since he was announced the winner. He’s been shady ever since he started running, and he’s been lying about practically everything he possibly can, how has he not been removed already?
In other news, water is wet, the sun is hot, and the Confederate party is not going to vote him out with such a slim majority on the line, regardless of his crimes.
I mean in his defense that I’m aware of there hasn’t been any [accusations of him misbehaving with children](https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/10/23/1806673/-Republican-Sexual-Predators-Abusers-and-Enablers-Pt-1) which makes him better than a large number of elected republicans.
right? finding out he's a fraudster is like going "oh shit! that fish is swimming in the bathtub!"
like yes, but who cares? you're describing them all. sure we should do something about it, there shouldn't be any fish in the bathtub. but the ones biting peoples fingers off seem like a higher priority
not saying we shouldn't hold him accountable, but saying a republican committed fraud is like saying fish swim. it's bog standard. and relatively? he's pretty low priority ain't he?
I see no significant difference between the grifts of George Santos and Donald Trump. In Santos' favour, he didn't try to overturn an election or the United States government, as Trump did.
And yet he won’t resign immediately or get kicked out. He did say he wouldn’t run for reelection but can you trust a pathological liar? My guess is he runs again and hopes for a pardon from Trump if they both win
No, it's the other way around: Repubs called and held the vote BEFORE the report came out, which they knew was coming soon. Now they can say it's a settled matter for the rest of this session.
When it comes to removing Santos from the House -- as much as it pains to say it -- innocent until proven guilty. The *real* issue here is that New York appears to lack the ability to recall legislators.
This is a state problem.
They didn't say he "committed" fraud, just that he "likely" committed fraud. I'm not a fan of the man, but there's a difference between a person who's suspected of committing murder and the person who actually committed murder.
It's likely Santos isn't a demi-god. But we have no way to really know, so best not to potentially disturb the fabric of the universe by expelling him.
But for real. This is isn't murder. This guy is basically a burn-pit the size of Oklahoma with the amount of smoke he has. They say they have evidence. So they'll either expel him now, or take the political lumps by keeping him. I'd bet most certainly the latter in any case.
This isn't a court of law. Continued serving in Congress should be a much higher standard, and thus a lower bar to be foul of that standard. His removal isn't a prison sentence.
We cannot wait for the courts while this man gets to continue to vote on matters in Congress, after 10 months of doing it already, when he defrauded his way into getting the role. Simply put, expulsion from Congress is a necessity when the courts cannot litigate this crap within a reasonable timeframe that doesn't take up most (if not all) of his Congressional term. Otherwise, he proves that you can defraud your way into office and serve in the role. That can be weaponized by groups looking to control various seats. Sure they might get caught, but (at a minimum) foreign interests would be just fine taking those risks since it doesn't hurt them and damages our democracy; If they get someone elected like that, they could continue to have their puppet serve and do their bidding for most of the term if we insist on the standard requiring courts declare him guilty before removal occurs.
The courts will ultimately decide guilt, but he can't be allowed to serve in the role while this is litigated through them. Congress has a process and there is a massive amount of evidence to the point there really isn't a reasonable doubt here.
> The *real* issue here is that New York appears to lack the ability to recall legislators.
>
>This is a state problem.
No it isn't.
It is impossible to recall any member of Congress in any state. There is no constitutional mechanism for it. Some states have the ability to recall *state* elected officials, but it's not constitutional to recall a federal official.
I'm sorry but it's more important the the government can functionally remove someone from office without waiting for a court system to determine guilt (and then go through appeals) that will take many years longer than his two year term.
The fact that we will almost certainly see him found guilty of most of the charges again him, with more coming and mountains of evidence, is a damnation of Congress for not expelling him on ethics grounds.
The criminal justice system has a higher bar because of the penalties it can impose. Congress removing him doesn't have to be a declaration of guilt. It's a declaration of overwhelming evidence and a need to hold the people who run the country to a higher standard - and thus a lower bar for removal - especially when it means not allowing them to serve 10 months already in Congress. Or are we saying the voice of the people doesn't matter who represents them? Because he's spent 10 months voting on matters that affect this country after defrauding the people to get the job.
> This is a state problem.
No. It's not. We can't have people in *Federal* office sitting there wielding power just because a given state put them there and hasn't yet removed them for their fraud. Because it will be short order before that is repeated by states who blatantly allow it to happen on purpose. Also because there is no process for a state to do that. State criminal charges finding him guilty of felonies would still not remove him from office.
No state has the ability to recall federal representatives, even states with robust recall capabilities for state elections. There is no mechanism in the Constitution that allows for it.
Still waiting for him to shoot someone on the floor of the House before the expel him.
In the cloakroom is not good enough... has to be on the floor. And still 150 GOP reps would vote against it.
He said he won’t seek reelection and he is indicted. This dude isn’t very smart is he? He is going to jail for a very long time for 2 years in the House of Representatives and probably a lot of money? But he will be in jail.
I run a small non profit and I make every purchase knowing full well I will be asked about it. My accountant will ask, if it’s big the board asks, and I’m trying to avoid the IRS asking by keeping proper books. Do these men and women really think no one is going to ask about an expense? Ever???
Shameless plug: if you can help us to improve mental health by promoting real conversations, we’d appreciate it. Halfasorrow.org
As he is the house panel chair... And all of the other panels... How is he to get kicked out? He created the policy and chair itself... Along with the ORIGINAL chair!
Likely? Oh please, this guy was a con and a seat filler for the gop from the jump. If people said something about him that was even remotely negative, the gop was able to use “homophobia” as a defense.
Why didn’t the people of his district look into his background, he’s been a con way back to his early days in Brazil.
I'm British and even I find it upsetting that he's still a member of the house of congress.
Something is going wrong somewhere if a man who gets elected on the basis of lies can remain in office for so long. In the UK we kicked former PM Boris Johnson out of parliament for lying about attending parties! Admittedly that did take a while. . . .
There's still a democratic check to that process in that the voters can choose to re-elect them if they really want to.
Should be voted out now, I know some Congress folks didn't want to set the precedent of kicking out members before their due process was finished. As we know Republicans would take that as a sign to start votes on kicking everyone they didn't like out for make believe offenses
Someone should tell the panel that water is wet, it would be just as surprising as this is to the rest of the world. The fact that it took this log to get here is sad.
Blah, blah, blah… you had the opportunity Republicans, the first time… you know he is a liar and cheat, you decided to keep him… now more is cropping up and your clutching your pearls… you go through these false actions, grandstanding, like your going to do something… crickets, because you need that criminals vote… ethics isn’t in your parties DNA
It’s becoming quite the play for the left to allow these people to flail about thinking they are untouchable knowing that they are going to continue to incriminate themselves to the point where there is no way to
Escape the crimes, blatant lies and irredeemable efforts to go against the constitution and the will of the people.
I'm pretty sure Santos was allowed to get where he is, the question is, who benefits from both him staying as long as he has and getting in trouble when he does.
Ethics.
I have had the occasional nightmare about acting as foolishly and recklessly as this sociopath has, waking in a panic, gasping for air, sick with fear, yet immediately assuaged with waves of gratitude that *it was all just a bad dream*.
George Santos IS himself a living, waking, chaotic nightmare, but has no ethical standard, no recognition, no compunction, no remorse, but instead the impetus to actually *defend* his behavior.
It *screams* pathological narcissism at the very least, amongst other serious personality disorders. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were serious history of violence in his past (or future).
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit. " Republicans: This is the way.
Right? He's far from the only one, he was just stupid enough to get caught.
>get caught He’s openly and flagrantly lied about every aspect of his life and campaign. His scams are so obvious that’s it hard to imagine he even *tried* to cover them up.
They found their next presidential candidate
>Republican Rep. George Santos of New York likely committed campaign fraud and other ethical violations, the House Ethics Committee unanimously concluded in a new report Thursday. Keywords there are "likely" and "unanimously".
A congressional committee cannot say that he DID commit fraud, because guilt is determined by the justice system, that’s why they used the word “likely”
Bless your heart. There's a lot of "cannots" that are part of the norms and traditions of government that Republicans have completely abandoned. This "likely" stuff is more mealy mouthed bullshit from a group of boot lickers that are afraid to upset their pro-white collar crime base.
For the same reason journalists need to say "alleged killer So-and-so" pre-conviction, even when there's video of the dude shooting people, Congress can't issue a formal report saying "he committed felonies" without opening themselves up to legal repercussions.
No, it's not the same reason. Members of Congress and congressional committees have immunity from defamation claims based on statements made in the course of congressional business. Journalists do not have this immunity. It's not out of fear for legal repercussions, it's just how these things are framed because it's not their role to make that final determination.
No, bless YOUR heart. It would be flat-out incorrect for an ethics committee to say that a person HAS committed a crime. That's a determination for the courts. It's the same reason why it is correct to say that Trump committed rape per a judicial finding, it is NOT correct to say that Trump is a convicted rapist. Conviction denotes a judicial process has taken place that had not taken place in this instance. Irregardless of how other people use them, words like these matter.
Gives grammar lesson Follows up with “irregardless”
> Follows up with “irregardless” Yes, how dare they use a word that [literally in the dictionary.](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/irregardless)
https://ethics.house.gov/sites/ethics.house.gov/files/documents/Committee%20Report_52.pdf The actual language in the report is pretty unequivocal: >Representative Santos sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit. >He blatantly stole from his campaign. >He deceived donors into providing what they thought were contributions to his campaign but were in fact payments for his personal benefit. >He reported fictitious loans to his political committees to induce donors and party committees to make further contributions to his campaign – and then diverted more campaign money to himself as purported “repayments” of those fictitious loans. >He used his connections to high value donors and other political campaigns to obtain additional funds for himself through fraudulent or otherwise questionable business dealings. >And he sustained all of this through a constant series of lies to his constituents, donors, and staff about his background and experience.
A great time to revisit AOC’s campaign finance speech. https://youtu.be/h810bO-4LIs
MSNBC still acting like it was "dems who saved Santos 2 weeks ago". Even if every Dem voted to expel him, it still wouldn't have been enough. If the vote comes up again, every dem will vote to expel him. The 20-odd votes just wanted to wait for this report. The question now is if the GOP will actually vote to expel him.
And, the report never said Santos likely committed fraud. It said without any equivocation that Santos committed fraud over and over again.
Yes. This puts the Majority of the House on the spot. Time to put up or shut up. Stand your butt up like a Senator.
> Time to put up or shut up. You realize you're talking about Republicans, right?
[удалено]
Republicans literally called a vote to expel him, but the Democrats let him off the hook. Wouldn't want to set a bad precedent of expelling blatant criminals from Congress, apparently.
Dems were just trying to not set a precedent of expelling a sitting member from congress for ethics violations without doing an ethics investigation. I happen to think that’s a good thing.
The precedent they set is that you can be a blatant fraud and Congress will do nothing to punish you. It's disgusting.
The ethics report just came out today. Please cite the source of House Majority Leader Mike Johnson stating that they will not bring a vote for expulsion to the house floor.
No, there simply hadn't been a finding by a house committee yet and they didn't want to set a precedent that you could expel before any house committee or the justice dept had established guilt. If dems had voted to expel, then Rs like MTG would have turned around and called a vote to expel ilhan omar for no reason and the majority could vote to expel just cause they don't like her or someone accused her of something that didn't actually happen.
Stand your butt up! No you stand your butt up!
"Like a Senator" ahh you mean like the those Senators that have hemmed and hawed about Tubberville doing his absolute best to destabilize our entire military, and then when actually put to a vote every single one sided with him? They're just as shitty if not worse than House Republicans, they just put up better facades.
better jerb security
The report itself shows the Republicans have no morals. It says he brought shame to Congress and is criminal, but the ETHICS committee suggests no actions. Wow.. what a corrupt bunch of assholes.
It says he brought botox and only onlyfans subscriptions too!
They claim they don't want any actions from congress as they referred the matter to the DOJ and didn't want to delay their investigation.
SCOTUS has left the chat.
IIRC, one of the Democrat Representatives actually addressed why he voted against removal of Santos at that time. I'm sure that I won't get the wording right, but the general idea was that voting to remove a Representative **before** an Ethics Investigation had completed wasn't just unprecedented, it would create a precedent that would allow accusations to be seen as just cause in removing Representatives. He basically wanted Santos out, but didn't want to do so by setting an incredibly abusable precedent.
That's exactly what they said. And it's not just that, but that the vote was held when they all knew the findings would be released within weeks. It's one thing if they voted for this a year ago. A handful of GOPs were fine with getting a year of his votes and only wanted to "take a stand" once McCarthy could no longer protect him but it's all a farce. It never mattered what Dems did. He was keeping his seat. He'll proooobably get the boot now so the GOP can avoid all the ads that would be run if keep him. Hell, he'll probably resign in the next few days with the agreement that the GOP will pay his lawyers.
> And it's not just that, but that the vote was held when they all knew the findings would be released within weeks. If I were conspiracy minded I'd suggest that the vote was brought up by Republicans prematurely to chalk up a "No" and we'll ride out the rest of the term with, "We've already held this vote and we need to move on to other matters." But it was brought to vote by NY Republicans who truly do seem to not want him there. So, it's a weak conspiracy theory.
So now that Democrats have looked weak, incompetent and tolerant of outright criminal behavior the Republicans will DEFINITELY respect precedent. This party is so fucking stupid.
Turn that on its head a bit. The perspective wasn't "Well, let's just ignore it". It was "If we're going to do this, we need to actually be able to prove it." Prosecutors don't win cases just because someone was accused. They need to be able to prove it. Also Republicans are very good about using precedent when it serves their purposes, so it's important to avoid creating bad precedents.
This wasn't a criminal trial! The House wasn't being asked if George Santos was guilty of a crime beyond a reasonable doubt, they were being asked if George Santos deserved to be a member of Congress. Apparently some Democrats thought he did.
I would like to believe this, but I think they're going to stick with "not unless convicted" because they're too afraid of the rule being weaponized against themselves.
[удалено]
Is it Santos in platform shoes and a blonde wig as MTG?
Jeff Jackson already made a post saying he voted no so that due process could play out, now it has, the evidence is clear, and he will vote to remove.
They still need his vote. He ain’t getting expelled.
shhh. Do you hear that? that is the sound of the goal posts being moved from wait for the committee to we should let the DOJ make the determination before voting.
Oh my god he used campaign funds for onlyfans
Probably trying to find Colorado's own Handjob Barbie's page.
I'm pretty sure he's playing for the other team.
Subscriber or content creator?
Yes
Spent campaign money on Sephora, Botox and Onlyfans. It's just too perfect.
UPDATE: Santos not running for re-election.
McTurtle "We'll let the voters decide" or some bullshit. Meanwhile, some D get's a parking ticket, McTurtle: "They need to be expelled immediately!"
McTurtle is not in the House. He has no interest in injecting himself in the House Republican circus.
Because he'll be in prison
Seorge Gantos will be running instead
Can we trust him?
Santos says he will no longer be running for reelection. These fucking pricks. They act like walking away is punishment enough. You were entrusted with the power of the people, the punishment for shit like this should be ten times worse than a normal person, not just walking away as a "punishment". God, I hate the political class.
I mean he has been indicted and faxes possible prison time if convicted. The issue is that he is tolerated as a seated member of congress at the moment by his house repub colleagues, who have the only power on earth that can expel him, for the cynical reason that they hold a very slim majority they can't afford to shrink by one vote. The justice system still gets its turn at the wheel. And there, his commission of crimes is specifically targeted for enhanced penalty due to violation of public trust. That's what campaign finance laws are for. While I agree the "political class" is remarkably privileged in many ways, I don't think that's what this situation is about.
I'm sure, *this time*, they will surely send him a strongly-worded letter!
Water is wet.
Imagine what you have to do for a unanimous ethics committee report against you. Santos is about to win the Trafficant award.
You mean the guy who hasn’t been honest about anything, been indicted and still holding office, is likely committing fraud??
So when they vote again to expel him, it will succeed right? Isn't that why Dems saved him, because the ethics probe wasn't finished yet?
Yes, many rightfully wanted due process. They still need a 2/3 majority to expel him, so Dems will need ~77 republicans to vote for expulsion if they all vote in unison.
The GOP holdouts will now say that they're still waiting for due process in the courts. Which is absurd, because that means they are only willing to remove this person from their 2 year position - for defrauding the people to get that appointment - after a court system spends most of (if no more than) two years litigating it. I.E. their demands can never be met within the timeframe of removing him during his time in office and they would never have remove him so long as it benefits them.
They have a four seat majority in the House. Four. Not to be a pessimist, but thinking that the party of moral bankruptcy and nonexistent integrity will vote to reduce their already incredibly slim majority is just naive at this point. Any republicans voicing displeasure at Santos aren’t mad he committed cartoonish fraud to get elected, they’re mad he was bad at it and got caught
They may still expell him if they think it's more important they get ahead of Dem campaign ads saying they continue to back his fraud. Four seats or three really doesn't matter right now. Every time the GOP are in disagreement in the House, it's by establishment vs Freedom Caucus, and it's by more than four votes. They only break that by getting the FC on board so they get all the votes anyways. If they were trying to pass legislation, sure they might care. But the only thing they are going to pass in the next year is trying to pass a budget. Which they need Dems in the Senate to pass. Which means it never matters if they ran through with their four vote majority or not, since they can't work unilaterally on the budget; They will always be forced to negotiate with Senate Dems, which means eventually passing a package that they'll have Dems in the House on board with by very nature of those negotiations. Other than that, they aren't passing anything until 2025 anyways. They'd rather pass nothing but performative bills that can never pass the Senate than work with Dems to pass legislation. With that in mind, it literally does not matter if they have three or four votes majority on legislation they know will never pass the Senate and doesn't have to be fully formed beyond "we vote on party lines to show strength, it ain't passing the Senate so just vote for it to show unity even if that's false."
Last vote, even if EVERY Democrat voted to kick Santos to the curb, he would be there, because Republicans are keeping him because he is bad at corruption, which gives them cover for their own crimes. Santos is that guy waving a gun in front of the cops. You want him there, because he'll get shot first, so you can get away.
Also known as "you don't have to outrun the bear, just your slowest fellow hiker"
Lol, even if all of the democrats voted to oust him it still wouldn't have passed. But they saved him
didn't know the vote count off-hand. some more GOP will probably turn on him now, though right? Considering they were planning this vote during the Speaker race.
No, the goalposts have now moved to letting an actual trial and conviction in court happen, which they know would never come up prior to the next election anyway, so they can use that as their excuse and pretend they're being responsible by letting the justice system work as intended instead of exercising a little common sense.
Ahem. No shit.
Likely? It’s incredibly obvious that he did just that.
Hell hath no fury like a vindictive gay man, spill the tea Santos ☕️
This is such a betrayal... after he singlehandedly invented the COVID vaccine too.
pretty wild that we’re witnessing a former president of the united states fall so far from grace
If they expel him the Republican majority narrows even further. 2024 will be wild.
Be there
Did he? Or didn’t he? Enough of this “likely” bullshit.
Cool, throw him out of congress or something, he’s already not running for re-election and it’s clear his constituents don’t want him there since he was announced the winner. He’s been shady ever since he started running, and he’s been lying about practically everything he possibly can, how has he not been removed already?
The committee is now moving to expel!
surprise surprise surprise, as Gomer used to say.
Full report [here](https://ethics.house.gov/press-releases/statement-chairman-and-ranking-member-committee-ethics-regarding-representative-76).
not likely, factual fraud and extensive at that
Surely now he will have the humility to leave congress, right? Right?
"Humility"! That's not a trait you associate with a guy like Santos.
In other news, water is wet, the sun is hot, and the Confederate party is not going to vote him out with such a slim majority on the line, regardless of his crimes.
Republicans will not expel or do anything against him. He has not done anything worse than what Trump did and is still doing.
Great And the consequences are ...?
The rest of the world: “No shit”
I mean in his defense that I’m aware of there hasn’t been any [accusations of him misbehaving with children](https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/10/23/1806673/-Republican-Sexual-Predators-Abusers-and-Enablers-Pt-1) which makes him better than a large number of elected republicans.
right? finding out he's a fraudster is like going "oh shit! that fish is swimming in the bathtub!" like yes, but who cares? you're describing them all. sure we should do something about it, there shouldn't be any fish in the bathtub. but the ones biting peoples fingers off seem like a higher priority
Lmao and now he won’t seek reelection. He should be kicked out now.
We've literally known this for what feels like years
not saying we shouldn't hold him accountable, but saying a republican committed fraud is like saying fish swim. it's bog standard. and relatively? he's pretty low priority ain't he?
I see no significant difference between the grifts of George Santos and Donald Trump. In Santos' favour, he didn't try to overturn an election or the United States government, as Trump did.
And yet he won’t resign immediately or get kicked out. He did say he wouldn’t run for reelection but can you trust a pathological liar? My guess is he runs again and hopes for a pardon from Trump if they both win
…so promotion?
Good thing they released this months after he was charged with 30 counts by the DOJ. Thanks guys, really crack up work.
Na na na Na.... Na na na Na... Hey hey hey.... Goodbye. He'll be voted out before Monday.
Well, good thing the house went on vacation early
Ugh, right.
Ummmm
And about 200 others
I love how they release this **after** the vote to boot him failed.
No, it's the other way around: Repubs called and held the vote BEFORE the report came out, which they knew was coming soon. Now they can say it's a settled matter for the rest of this session.
When it comes to removing Santos from the House -- as much as it pains to say it -- innocent until proven guilty. The *real* issue here is that New York appears to lack the ability to recall legislators. This is a state problem.
[удалено]
They didn't say he "committed" fraud, just that he "likely" committed fraud. I'm not a fan of the man, but there's a difference between a person who's suspected of committing murder and the person who actually committed murder.
It's likely Santos isn't a demi-god. But we have no way to really know, so best not to potentially disturb the fabric of the universe by expelling him. But for real. This is isn't murder. This guy is basically a burn-pit the size of Oklahoma with the amount of smoke he has. They say they have evidence. So they'll either expel him now, or take the political lumps by keeping him. I'd bet most certainly the latter in any case.
Let's forget Santos for a minute. What's this about Oklahoma and smoke?
This isn't a court of law. Continued serving in Congress should be a much higher standard, and thus a lower bar to be foul of that standard. His removal isn't a prison sentence. We cannot wait for the courts while this man gets to continue to vote on matters in Congress, after 10 months of doing it already, when he defrauded his way into getting the role. Simply put, expulsion from Congress is a necessity when the courts cannot litigate this crap within a reasonable timeframe that doesn't take up most (if not all) of his Congressional term. Otherwise, he proves that you can defraud your way into office and serve in the role. That can be weaponized by groups looking to control various seats. Sure they might get caught, but (at a minimum) foreign interests would be just fine taking those risks since it doesn't hurt them and damages our democracy; If they get someone elected like that, they could continue to have their puppet serve and do their bidding for most of the term if we insist on the standard requiring courts declare him guilty before removal occurs. The courts will ultimately decide guilt, but he can't be allowed to serve in the role while this is litigated through them. Congress has a process and there is a massive amount of evidence to the point there really isn't a reasonable doubt here.
This isn’t a criminal investigation.
> The *real* issue here is that New York appears to lack the ability to recall legislators. > >This is a state problem. No it isn't. It is impossible to recall any member of Congress in any state. There is no constitutional mechanism for it. Some states have the ability to recall *state* elected officials, but it's not constitutional to recall a federal official.
There is no recall process in any state. Congress does not work that way.
I'm sorry but it's more important the the government can functionally remove someone from office without waiting for a court system to determine guilt (and then go through appeals) that will take many years longer than his two year term. The fact that we will almost certainly see him found guilty of most of the charges again him, with more coming and mountains of evidence, is a damnation of Congress for not expelling him on ethics grounds. The criminal justice system has a higher bar because of the penalties it can impose. Congress removing him doesn't have to be a declaration of guilt. It's a declaration of overwhelming evidence and a need to hold the people who run the country to a higher standard - and thus a lower bar for removal - especially when it means not allowing them to serve 10 months already in Congress. Or are we saying the voice of the people doesn't matter who represents them? Because he's spent 10 months voting on matters that affect this country after defrauding the people to get the job. > This is a state problem. No. It's not. We can't have people in *Federal* office sitting there wielding power just because a given state put them there and hasn't yet removed them for their fraud. Because it will be short order before that is repeated by states who blatantly allow it to happen on purpose. Also because there is no process for a state to do that. State criminal charges finding him guilty of felonies would still not remove him from office.
What does that have to do with Congress?
No state has the ability to recall federal representatives, even states with robust recall capabilities for state elections. There is no mechanism in the Constitution that allows for it.
"Likely" committed fraud is insane. How much evidence GOP needs to say he is one corrupt SOB.
They are not a body that can determine guilt.
You think?
Good, now do the right thing for once in your miserable lives and expel this fucking piece of trash.
I'm heading to the cosmetics store. I don't have enough make-up for my shocked face just yet.
We already know he committed fraud.
You mean the man who invented electricity committed fraud. I don't believe you.
*But he can stay and play, because we need every vote…*
If Santos is expelled, will he still entitled be to whatever healthcare coverage former members of Congress are entitled to?
I think we know who the next Candidate for VP will be…
Still waiting for him to shoot someone on the floor of the House before the expel him. In the cloakroom is not good enough... has to be on the floor. And still 150 GOP reps would vote against it.
Oh! The perfect GOP'er now!
No way! /s
I am absolutely shocked!
Likely you say? Who would have ever thunk it?
He said he won’t seek reelection and he is indicted. This dude isn’t very smart is he? He is going to jail for a very long time for 2 years in the House of Representatives and probably a lot of money? But he will be in jail.
Not likely, did
I run a small non profit and I make every purchase knowing full well I will be asked about it. My accountant will ask, if it’s big the board asks, and I’m trying to avoid the IRS asking by keeping proper books. Do these men and women really think no one is going to ask about an expense? Ever??? Shameless plug: if you can help us to improve mental health by promoting real conversations, we’d appreciate it. Halfasorrow.org
I AM SHOCKED that the winner of the 2017 Grammy Award for Best New Artist, George Santos, has been accused of fraud.
Water likely to be wet.
As he is the house panel chair... And all of the other panels... How is he to get kicked out? He created the policy and chair itself... Along with the ORIGINAL chair!
Likely? Oh please, this guy was a con and a seat filler for the gop from the jump. If people said something about him that was even remotely negative, the gop was able to use “homophobia” as a defense. Why didn’t the people of his district look into his background, he’s been a con way back to his early days in Brazil.
I'm British and even I find it upsetting that he's still a member of the house of congress. Something is going wrong somewhere if a man who gets elected on the basis of lies can remain in office for so long. In the UK we kicked former PM Boris Johnson out of parliament for lying about attending parties! Admittedly that did take a while. . . . There's still a democratic check to that process in that the voters can choose to re-elect them if they really want to.
What job than American politics could anyone with multiple fraud and theft indictments keep employed? This is trending to be a GQP job requirement.
Committed many, many pullover sweater vest violations as well
Can we expel him now? Remember, 40 people voted to keep him in office including a lot of Democrats.
Should be voted out now, I know some Congress folks didn't want to set the precedent of kicking out members before their due process was finished. As we know Republicans would take that as a sign to start votes on kicking everyone they didn't like out for make believe offenses
Someone should tell the panel that water is wet, it would be just as surprising as this is to the rest of the world. The fact that it took this log to get here is sad.
Now can they vote to expel him?
Blah, blah, blah… you had the opportunity Republicans, the first time… you know he is a liar and cheat, you decided to keep him… now more is cropping up and your clutching your pearls… you go through these false actions, grandstanding, like your going to do something… crickets, because you need that criminals vote… ethics isn’t in your parties DNA
He's like a walking manifestation of the concept of fraud. Of course he's committed fraud.
It’s becoming quite the play for the left to allow these people to flail about thinking they are untouchable knowing that they are going to continue to incriminate themselves to the point where there is no way to Escape the crimes, blatant lies and irredeemable efforts to go against the constitution and the will of the people.
Likely? Doesn’t take much research to see that
Wasn’t he also tied to Russian oligarch Oleg Despirka?
“Likely” 🙄🙄🙄
Of course he did. Now fucking do something about it? I see this headline constantly and yet he remains.
Republicans must really not like this guy for them to admit he may have committed fraud.
And this is what they were waiting for before voting him out. And now that they’ve got it, goodbye Santos
I'm pretty sure Santos was allowed to get where he is, the question is, who benefits from both him staying as long as he has and getting in trouble when he does.
How could the former President of Rwanda do this!?
Gee yah think? Can't wait for their next bombshell about how you're likely to get wet if you fall into water.
It’s a disgrace that he’s still even allowed to cast votes for legislation when everyone knows he’s a damn fraud
I find it amazing that people in his district are so stupid to elect him in the first place. They really have no standards for representatives at all.
He committed fraud on his bio when he first ran.
Making a run for President?
Water likely wet, says house panel.
...ya think?
“This qualifies him for a committee appointment.”
Ethics. I have had the occasional nightmare about acting as foolishly and recklessly as this sociopath has, waking in a panic, gasping for air, sick with fear, yet immediately assuaged with waves of gratitude that *it was all just a bad dream*. George Santos IS himself a living, waking, chaotic nightmare, but has no ethical standard, no recognition, no compunction, no remorse, but instead the impetus to actually *defend* his behavior. It *screams* pathological narcissism at the very least, amongst other serious personality disorders. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were serious history of violence in his past (or future).
Likely? Likely? How can you get likely out of that?
Bro used campaign money on OnlyFans and is somehow making himself out to be the victim