Former GOP Lawmaker To Plead Guilty To Fraud
Reports emerged on Saturday that a former GOP lawmaker is set to plead guilty to multiple charges in an ongoing fraud investigation against him.
Sources close to the investigation told the Hill that former Rep. George Santos (R-NY) will plead guilty to some of the charges against him on Monday. According to the source, who reports suggest has inside knowledge of the matter, the guilty plea will help the former lawmaker avoid trial in September on 23 criminal charges.
The source revealed that the former New York lawmaker will plead guilty to multiple charges but did not specify which.
Investigators initially charged Santos with 13 charges after he was found to have allegedly misled campaign donors. The former lawmaker was also accused of falsely charging donors’ credit cards without authorization and falsely inflating campaign finance reports.
Some of the allegations against the disgraced former congressman included fraudulently receiving unemployment benefits and lying on his financial disclosures in May 2023.
Reports of Santos’ impending guilty plea come after two of his former staffers pleaded guilty in 2023 to various charges relating to the ousted lawmaker. Nancy Marks, Santos’ former campaign treasurer, and fundraising worker Samuel Miele both admitted to multiple charges over their work with the former lawmaker.
According to the Justice Department, Miele admitted to impersonating a high-ranking aide to a member of House leadership while soliciting funds for Santos. He also admitted to access device fraud by charging credit cards without authorization for contributions to Santos’ and other candidates’ campaigns. Miele also used some of those unauthorized credit charges for his personal use.
Marks, on the other hand, pleaded guilty to several conspiracy charges, including wire fraud, making materially false statements, aggravated identity theft and obstructing the administration of the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
Santos was expelled from Congress last December after the House Ethics Committee reported several wrongdoings against him. The reports alleged that Santos willfully filed false reports with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and used campaign funds for personal purposes.
The committee also found that Santos used campaign funds for subscriptions to OnlyFans and botox treatments while wilfully violating ethics laws in relation to his Financial Disclosure (FD) Statements filed with the House.
Santos, who flipped a competitive New York seat red in 2022, became the first openly gay Republican not an incumbent to win a House seat. His two years in Congress were marred by several scandals, including living a double life in Brazil, where he posed as a drag queen.
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03rd Sep 2024[…] Former GOP Lawmaker To Plead Guilty To Fraud […]