Gay Democrat introduces resolution to censure George Santos

Out Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-NY) and other House Democrats have introduced a privileged resolution to censure fellow New Yorker Rep. George Santos (R-NY), mainly for lying about his personal and professional life in order to get elected to Congress.

“For too long, House Republicans, under the leadership of Speaker [Kevin] McCarthy, have been shielding and protecting Rep. Santos from any shred of accountability,” Torres said at a press conference yesterday, where he was joined by original cosponsors Reps. Robert Garcia (D-CA) and Dan Goldman (D-NY). “Back in May, they shamelessly voted to keep him in Congress and told the American people he would be dealt with expeditiously by the House Ethics Committee within 60 days. It has now been 60 days and Rep. Santos continues to defraud the people of his district and disgrace our institution.”

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“I cannot help but conclude that the Republican strategy is one of infinite and indefinite delays in an attempt to shield George Santos from accountability,” he continued.

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Torres was referring to a resolution introduced in May by three out House Democrats – Garcia along with Reps. Becca Balint (D-VT) and Eric Sorensen (D-IL) – to expel Santos from the House. Republicans voted to send the resolution to committee, effectively killing it.

The resolution that Torres introduced wouldn’t expel Santos but would censure him, putting it on his permanent record.

Because the resolution won’t remove Santos from office – allowing Republicans to keep their narrow majority in the House – Torres said Republicans have no reason not to vote for it if they believe that Santos has lied extensively to voters.

He said that the purpose of the resolution he introduced yesterday is “transparency.” “The American people have a right to know where each and every member of Congress stands on the question of George Santos, on the question of whether and how to hold him accountable,” Torres said at yesterday’s press conference.

“There are Republicans who claim to feel outraged over the lies of George Santos. But not a single one of those Republicans, not even the so-called moderate Republicans, have pressured House Republican leadership to hold George Santos accountable,” he continued.

The other reason for his resolution, Torres said, is accountability for House Republican leadership, which he said promised “a quick and rapid investigation,” and also for Santos himself.

“Mr. Santos feels no shame, he feels no remorse, and even though he imagines himself to be a civil rights icon in the mold of Rosa Parks, the rest of us who live in the real world see him for who he is: a complete charlatan who has lied his way into the United States Congress,” Torres said.

Santos said in a statement that Democrats have “completely lost focus on the work tey should be doing” and that his “record proves that my office is hard at work.”

The Republican majority is also working hard to get the country back on track and clean up the mess left behind by destructive one-party Democrat rule. It is time to stop the political ping-pong and get real work done.

-Congressman Santos

— Rep. George Santos (@RepSantosNY03) July 17, 2023

This isn’t the first measure Torres has taken against Santos. In January, he introduced the Stop Another Non Truthful Office Seeker Act (SANTOS Act), which would require candidates for Congress to provide information about their education, military service, and employment history. It would punish those who lie about their background with a $100,000 fine and/or a one-year prison sentence.

In December, mere weeks after becoming the first out gay Republican elected to Congress, Santos’s life story came crumbling down. Multiple news reports said that there was no record of him attending the elite high school he said he attended or the colleges and universities he claimed to have degrees from. Citigroup and Goldman Sachs – the Wall Street banks he claimed to have worked for – had no record of his employment. Even his charity “Friends of Pets” was registered nowhere.

Santos admitted to adding “fluff” to his resume but denied criminal behavior, although he later confessed to writing fraudulent checks in Brazil. He also faces 13 federal fraud charges in connection to several alleged schemes to enrich himself through unemployment insurance and campaign contributions.

The censure resolution is below.

RESOLUTION

Censuring Representative George Santos.

Whereas Representative George Santos repeatedly lied to voters in his district, donors, and the American public during his campaign to be elected to Congress;

Whereas a number of Republicans in Congress have called on George Santos to resign due to his hurtful lies and mistruths that have broken the trust of his constituents;

Whereas George Santos lied about being a member of the Jewish faith during his Congressional campaign and deliberately misrepresented that his grandparents survived the Holocaust;

Whereas George Santos falsely claimed that his mother died during the terrorist attacks on September 11th, 2001;

Whereas George Santos deliberately misrepresented his educational background by falsely claiming he received a bachelor’s degree from Baruch College and a master’s degree from New York University;

Whereas George Santos falsely claimed he obtained a volleyball scholarship to his college;

Whereas George Santos deliberately misrepresented his employment background, inaccurately claiming he worked at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup;

Whereas George Santos falsely claimed that he founded an animal rescue charity that saved more than 2,500 dogs and cats;

Whereas George Santos deliberately misrepresented that 4 of his employees were killed in the Pulse nightclub shooting;

Whereas George Santos falsely claimed that he helped produce the Broadway musical ‘‘Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark’’;

Whereas George Santos deliberately misrepresented that he had a family-owned real estate portfolio of 13 properties;

Whereas George Santos admitted to committing crimes in Brazil by using a fake name and stolen checkbook to purchase items; and

Whereas George Santos failed to file his congressional financial disclosure reports as required by law: Now, therefore, be it Resolved, That—

(1) Representative George Santos be censured;

(2) Representative George Santos forthwith

present himself in the well of the House of Representatives for the pronouncement of censure; and (3) Representative George Santos be censured with the public reading of this resolution by the Speaker.