May. 9, 2023 By Ben Brachfeld and Robert Pozarycki
Embattled New York Congress Member George Santos has been charged with federal crimes and could be hauled in front of a judge at Brooklyn’s Eastern District court as soon as Wednesday, CNN reported Tuesday afternoon.
The nature of the charges are unclear; charging documents remained under seal Tuesday afternoon and were not publicly accessible. A spokesperson for the Eastern District declined to comment on the matter. A spokesperson for Santos did not immediately respond to an amNewYork Metro inquiry.
The freshman Republican, who has repped eastern Queens and western Long Island after flipping the Third District from Democratic control in November, has faced a seemingly-unending slew of accusations that he fabricated his biography.
The waves started crashing down in December after the New York Times reported inconsistencies in his stated biography, with no record he had gone to school or worked where he said he did.
It all dovetailed from there, with reports accusing Santos of violating numerous campaign finance laws, orchestrating a check fraud scheme in Brazil, lying that his mother had died on 9/11, lying about his Jewish ethnicity, organizing a phony animal charity and stealing from a fundraiser for a dying dog, participating in an ATM-skimming scheme, and sexually harassing a staffer, among other things.
Aside from the feds, he is also facing probes from the Nassau County District Attorney, the state Attorney General, and the House Ethics Committee.
Despite the repeated exposés, Santos — who drew comparisons to Seinfeld’s George Costanza — has rebuffed all calls to resign. He took the oath of office on Jan. 3 as the new representative of New York’s 3rd District (covering northeast Queens, northern Nassau County and northwestern Suffolk County), and helped elect Kevin McCarthy as Speaker of the House during the marathon, 15-vote process that followed.
Santos’ refusal to go away stoked the anger of many of his constituents and colleagues in a rare, bipartisan way.
Constituents have regularly demonstrated outside Santos’ Douglaston, Queens office. The Nassau County GOP urged him to resign. Two other Long Island Republican Congress members, Nick LaLota and Anthony D’Esposito, also urged Santos to step aside.
Instead, Santos announced last month his intention to seek re-election in 2024. He already has at least one primary challenger on the Republican side, and one potential Democratic opponent in the general election.
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