Disgraced ex-U.S. Rep. George Santos should serve at least eight years behind bars after pleading guilty to fraud and identity theft charges, federal prosecutors said in court documents released Friday night.
Santos pleaded guilty in August to two of the 23 criminal counts he faced for inflating fundraising numbers and faking donor names to qualify for financial support from the Republican Party during the 2022 election cycle, when the political newcomer was elected to represent a slice of New York City and its eastern suburbs.
The former Congress member’s legal team asked for a two-year sentence in a Friday court filing. Prosecutors, however, recommended an 87-month sentence in a Friday filing, saying the top end of Santos’ guideline sentence range was appropriate to reflect the seriousness of his unparalleled crimes.
“Santos planned and executed an assortment of fraudulent schemes and leveraged them and a fictitious life story to enrich himself and capture one of the highest offices in the government of the United States,” prosecutors said.
Santos made headlines late in 2022, weeks after winning the midterm election for the 3rd Congressional District seat covering northern Nassau County and northeast Queens. The Republican was set to replace Democrat Tom Suozzi in the seat, who that year made a failed run for governor, when The New York Times reported that Santos embellished much of his resume — including his business background, education and even his personal faith.
Though he denied the charges in the Times report, the exposé led to numerous calls from both sides of the aisle for his resignation. Santos rebuffed them all and was eventually sworn in as a congressman in January 2023 after helping to elect Kevin McCarthy as House speaker in a marathon election.
Not long after taking office, the House Ethics Committee launched an investigation. Santos’ Republican colleagues from Long Island had tried to have him expelled in advance of the committee’s investigation report, but failed.
In May 2023, Santos was indicted for the first time on federal fraud charges; he would be charged in a second indictment that October. Both times, Santos — who by that point had drawn comparisons to “Seinfeld” pathological liar George Costanza — denied the charges and, borrowing a strategy from Donald Trump, alleged without evidence that he was the subject of a political witch hunt.
Weeks after McCarthy was ousted from the Speaker’s chair and Santos helped elect Mike Johnson of Louisiana as his successor, the House Ethics Committee released its report in November 2023, finding that Santos had “sought to fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy for his own personal financial profit.”
Finally, that December, the House voted to expel Santos from his office, making him the first House member to be thrown out without having been convicted of a criminal charge. Suozzi won back the 3rd Congressional seat the following February in a special election.
Still, Santos — who at that point said he would not run for re-election — flirted with a challenge to Republican Nick LaLota’s 1st Congressional District seat but ultimately declined to do so.
