Photo Courtesy of U.S. House of Representatives
Embattled Rep. George Santos
By Michael V. Cusenza
A 13-count indictment was unsealed on Wednesday in Central Islip, L.I. charging George Anthony Devolder Santos, better known as “George Santos,” a United States Congressman representing the Third District of New York (Queens and Long Island), with seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds, and two counts of making materially false statements to the House of Representatives.
The indictment was returned Tuesday under seal by a federal grand jury sitting in Central Islip. Santos was arrested Wednesday morning and arraigned Wednesday afternoon before U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlene R. Lindsay at the federal courthouse in Central Islip.
Santos has pleaded not guilty and is being released on a $500,000 bond.
As alleged in the indictment, Santos, who was elected to Congress last November and sworn in as the U.S. Representative for New York’s Third Congressional District on Jan. 7, 2023, engaged in multiple fraudulent schemes. Here are two:
Beginning in September 2022, during his successful campaign for Congress, Santos operated a limited liability company (Company #1) through which he allegedly defrauded prospective political supporters. Santos enlisted a Queens-based political consultant (Person #1) to communicate with prospective donors on Santos’s behalf. Santos allegedly directed Person #1 to falsely tell donors that, among other things, their money would be used to help elect Santos to the House, including by purchasing television advertisements. In reliance on these false statements, two donors (Contributor #1 and Contributor #2) each transferred $25,000 to Company #1’s bank account, which Santos controlled.
As alleged in the indictment, shortly after the funds were received into Company #1’s bank account, the money was transferred into Santos’s personal bank accounts—in one instance laundered through two of Santos’s personal accounts. Santos allegedly then used much of that money for personal expenses. Among other things, Santos allegedly used the funds to make personal purchases (including of designer clothing), to withdraw cash, to discharge personal debts, and to transfer money to his associates.
Additionally, beginning in approximately February 2020, Santos was employed as a Regional Director of a Florida-based investment firm (Investment Firm #1), where he earned an annual salary of approximately $120,000. By late-March 2020, in response to the outbreak of COVID-19 in the United States, new legislation was signed into law that provided additional federal funding to assist out-of-work Americans during the pandemic.
In mid-June 2020, although he was employed and was not eligible for unemployment benefits, Santos applied for government assistance through the New York State Department of Labor, allegedly claiming falsely to have been unemployed since March 2020. From that point until April 2021—when Santos was working and receiving a salary on a near-continuous basis and during his unsuccessful run for Congress—he falsely affirmed each week that he was eligible for unemployment benefits when he was not. As a result, Santos allegedly fraudulently received more than $24,000 in unemployment insurance benefits.
If convicted of the charges, Santos faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison for the top counts.
