A New York county prosecutor is investigating congressman-elect George Santos, after media investigations revealed the Long Island Republican made false claims on the campaign trail about his educational and career history and exagerated his Jewish heritage.
"The numerous fabrications and inconsistencies associated with Congressman-Elect Santos are nothing short of stunning. The residents of Nassau County and other parts of the third district must have an honest and accountable representative in Congress," Nassau County District Attorney Anne T Donnelly said in a statement on Tuesday, NBC News reports. "No one is above the law and if a crime was committed in this county, we will prosecute it.”
Mr Santos, the first openly gay non-incumbent Republican elected to Congress, falsely claimed to have worked at top Wall Street firms like Citigroup and Goldman Sachs after graduating from Baruch College, The New York Times reported last week.
The congressman-elect has also been accused about distorting his family history, at first claiming his mother was Jewish and that his grandparents fled the Nazis in WWII, only to later walk these statements back.
“I never claimed to be Jewish,” Mr Santos told the New York Post. “I am Catholic. Because I learned my maternal family had a Jewish background I said I was ‘Jew-ish.’”
The New York Republican has also faced scrutiny for his finances.
During his first run for Congress in 2020, financial disclosure forms showed Mr Santos had no assets and a salary of $55,000.
Two years later, his filings suggest he made between $3.5 and $11.5m in 2021 from his firm Devolder Organization, which works in the capital introduction business connecting investors, Semafor reports.
The company loaned Mr Santos’s congressional campaign $700,000, prompting criticisms from his future legislative colleagues.
“George Santos, a former call center employee falling behind on his rent, lent his campaign a staggering $705,000. Where did all that money come from?” New York representative Ritchie Torres wrote on Twitter on Monday. “The Ethics Committee MUST start investigating immediately.”
In a recent interview on Fox News, Mr Santos defended his credibility.
“So, look, I understand everybody wants to nitpick at me. I’m gonna reassure this once and for all,” he said. “I’m not a facade. I’m not a persona. I have an extensive career that I worked really hard to achieve.”
