Santos expelled from Congress
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Former representative George Santos exited the Capitol after he was expelled from Congress on Friday by a decisive two-thirds majority vote. AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough
By Ryan Schwach
George Santos’ tumultuous tenure in Congress has come to an end.
On Friday morning, by an overwhelming two-thirds majority vote, the United States House of Representatives voted to expel Queens and Long Island representative George Santos from their body, making him only the third member since the Civil War to be kicked out of Congress.
Santos abruptly exited the House shortly after the 311-114-2 vote, ending his short lived tenure in office riddled with accusations that he fabricated large portions of his background, nearly two dozen federal criminal charges and a damning House ethics report.
Governor Kathy Hochul now has 10-days to call a special election to fill the New York 3rd Congressional District, which includes areas of Northeastern Queens and is now vacant. By law, the election will have to take place between 70 and 80 days after Hochul calls for the election, meaning election day will occur at some point in February.
“I am prepared to undertake the solemn responsibility of filling the vacancy in New York’s 3rd District,” Hochul tweeted not long after the vote concluded.
In the meantime, Santos’ remaining staff will continue to handle constituent work until a successor is elected.
Santos’ time in the House began when he was elected in November 2022, defeating Democrat Robert Zimmerman to take NY-3 after predecessor Tom Suozzi chose not to seek re-election and instead make a failed bid for governor, challenging Hochul in the Democratic primary.
In December, questions began to surface related to Santos’ past, with suggestions that he had fabricated large parts of his resume and background.
The New York Times found that Santos had lied about his Jewish heritage, his education, his employment history and other personal, biographical details, like that his mother died while working at the World Trade Center on 9/11.
More news of his falsified past came to light through a slew of media reports in the weeks that followed.
He was accused of lying about having personal connections to the 2016 Pulse Nightclub shooting and that his niece was kidnapped from a Queens playground. It was reported that he had run a fraudulent pet nonprofit, and that he had claimed that he was a star volleyball player at Baruch College, a school he never attended.
Calls for Santos’ resignation quickly came in from both sides of the aisle, including from other Queens Republicans.
For the rest of early 2023, Santos repelled numerous controversies and ignored or denied all calls for him to step down from office.
In May, things got more serious for Santos after a federal court hit him with a 13-count indictment that included charges of fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds and false statements.
In what would become the first of two rounds of federal charges, Santos was accused of embezzling campaign donations.
He was also accused of insurance fraud for applying and receiving unemployment benefits he was not eligible for, and was charged with making false statements to Congress about his financial situation.
Even among the arraignments and court appearances, Santos still denied calls to resign, and began to face threats of expulsion.
In October, Santos was hit with another round of indictments, this time 10 charges alleging wire fraud, credit card fraud and identity theft, which included allegations he submitted false reports to the Federal Election Commission.
The later indictments alleged that not only had Santos embezzled campaign donations, but he fabricated them as well by repeatedly charging more donations on donors’ credit cards and pocketing the cash and using it to make personal purchases.
More than two-thirds of the House of Representatives, including 112 Republicans, voted to expel George Santos on Friday morning. Screenshot via the United States House of Representatives
Santos called the indictments against him a “witch hunt,” and denied the charges.
Then in November, the House Ethics Committee released a scathig report saying that Santos “cannot be trusted,” and that he used campaign donations for personal purposes.
Santos denied the legitimacy of the report, but did announce that he would not be seeking re-election.
Friday’s expulsion vote was the third attempt from his colleagues in Congress to expel him, and the first one to be successful.
Once Hochul triggers the special election, it will expedite the race for Santos’ seat by several months, a race already crowded with both Democrats and Republicans vying to replace Santos.
However, whoever wins the special election will only be a temporary filler, and there will still be regular primaries over the summer and a general election in November.
There are no primaries for the special though, leaving it up to local party leaders to appoint a nominee.
For the Democrats, that name could likely be a familiar one in Suozzi, Santos’ predecessor.
“This is a much-needed step in our journey to repair a broken system,” Suozzi said in a statement just after the expulsion vote passed. “We must move beyond our petty, partisan, performative finger-pointing and address the real problems Americans face. Let’s fix this!”
Suozzi declined to comment further to the Eagle.
The former representative is not alone however.
Former State Senator Anna Kaplan is also in the field, and has raised more money than any candidate still in the race.
“This has been an embarrassing episode, but now we can put it behind us,” Kaplan said in a statement on the expulsion. “For too long, a liar and a grifter has held this seat, and it is people who have suffered.”
Kaplan has also directed criticism towards Suozzi, who she accused of abandoning Queens residents and Long Islanders when he ran for governor.
“He abandoned us to George Santos,” she told POLITICO in November.
Democrats Zak Malamad and Joshua Lafazan had also raised significant funds, but both dropped out in November and backed Suozzi.
The race for the Republican nomination will also be complicated without Santos in the picture.
Leading the funding race is retired NYPD detective Michael D. Sapraicone, who called Santos a “crook” and a “fraudster” in a Friday tweet.
Air Force veterans Kellen Curry and Gregory Hach, as well as Daniel Norber, a Queens resident who was a member of the Israeli Defense Forces, are also making runs for the seat.
Currently, 11 candidates have filed campaign contributions with the federal government.
