House Ethics Chair Moves to Expel George Santos

The Republican chair of the bipartisan House Ethics Committee introduced a resolution Friday to expel Rep. George Santos of New York from Congress, citing the committee’s damning new report documenting pervasive campaign fraud and violations of House rules.

The move by Rep. Michael Guest of Mississippi, the committee’s chair, laid the groundwork for a pivotal vote after Thanksgiving that could make Santos the sixth representative to be ejected in the chamber’s history.

“The evidence uncovered in the Ethics Committee’s investigative subcommittee investigation is more than sufficient to warrant punishment,” Guest said in a statement accompanying his five-page resolution. “And the most appropriate punishment is expulsion.”

Santos, a Republican, has survived two expulsion efforts after a crush of reports in The New York Times and other publications exposed his fabricated life story and federal prosecutors charged him with 23 felonies.

But support for Santos appeared to be eroding fast Friday, as dozens of lawmakers in both parties indicated that the ethics report — showing how he spent tens of thousands of dollars in political contributions on Botox, Ferragamo goods and vacations — was the final straw for a lawmaker who has caused a year’s worth of political headaches.

Santos, 35, now faces a crucial decision: whether to stay and fight a potentially humiliating ouster, or preemptively resign in hopes of currying favor with prosecutors.

Leaving Congress would mean giving up his $174,000 annual salary as his legal bills pile up. Santos would also foreclose on any possibility of a congressional pension after he retires: Members must serve five years to receive one.

He has been unrepentant thus far, slamming the investigation Thursday as a “politicized smear” and pledging to continue to serve his constituents for as long as he was allowed. But in an apparent effort to head off an expulsion fight, he announced he would not seek another term in his Long Island and Queens district.

It was unclear if it would have the desired effect, though the threshold for expulsion is high: two-thirds of the chamber would have to vote in favor of removal.

“The report is thorough & damning,” Rep. Ashley Hinson, R-Iowa, wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter. “His conduct was illegal & unacceptable & Americans deserve better from their representatives.”

Rep. Jamie Raskin, an influential Democrat from Maryland, said he had opposed earlier censures of Santos to avoid setting a precedent “of expelling people based on intuition, without criminal convictions or formal disciplinary findings.”

“Now that those findings have been made of very serious misconduct in his case,” Raskin added, “our duty seems clear.”

The potential expulsion vote will also pose an early test for Speaker Mike Johnson, the new Republican leader, who had previously suggested that it would be premature to eject Santos with a criminal case underway. Santos has been a political drag on the party, but Republicans can scarcely afford to lose his seat given their razor-thin House majority.

In a statement Thursday evening, Johnson declined to give Santos cover. He called the report “very troubling,” and urged members of both parties to “consider the best interests of the institution.”

Back in New York, leaders in both parties were already deep into deliberations about a possible special election to fill Santos’ seat early next year. President Joe Biden won the district by 8 points in 2020, but Republicans have dominated the area since then.

If Santos were to step down or be removed, his seat would be subject to a special election scheduled by Gov. Kathy Hochul of New York. Local party leaders generally pick their nominees in special elections.

The Republican Party chair in Nassau County, New York, renewed calls for Santos to resign, and has been vetting possible candidates for months.

Democratic leaders have privately indicated that they would most likely put forward Thomas Suozzi, who held the seat before Santos but gave it up to run for governor.

Only five members of the House have been expelled in the body’s history. Three of them were expelled in the Civil War era for fighting for the Confederacy. Two others — Michael Myers in 1980 and James Traficant in 2002 — were convicted in criminal court before being expelled.

Before the report was released Wednesday, members of Congress made much of the precedent that would be set by removing Santos. They argued that he was just as entitled as any other American citizen to due process and had the right to be presumed innocent until proved otherwise.

At the same time, the Ethics Committee seemed to signal that it viewed this case as unlike any that had come before it. Despite a long-standing tradition of deference to federal prosecutors, the committee chose in this case to pursue its own investigation and release its findings publicly.

In its report, the committee explained that decision by citing a “duty to safeguard the integrity of the House and the interests of justice,” concluding that waiting would “effectively prevent the committee from exercising any oversight” of Santos.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/17/nyregion/santos-expel-house-election.html">The New York Times</a>.