House Expels George Santos From Congress
Mr. Santos is the sixth member of the House to be expelled in the body’s history, and the first who had not been convicted of a crime or accused of treason.
My god. This deliciously tasty excerpt:
In various campaign biographies, a résumé and interviews, Mr. Santos said he graduated from Baruch College in New York City, where he was a volleyball star on a championship team. He boasted of working at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs and amassing personal wealth. He claimed to be descended from Holocaust refugees; that his mother was in the World Trade Center during the Sept. 11 attacks; and that he lost four employees in the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando.
None of those claims were true.
The real question is where tf were the journalists while Santos was running his campaign on these false claims?
Too busy playing horse race? Frantically trying to find something newsworthy about Hunter Biden's laptop? Credulously glorifying some billionaire's childish misconceptions?
Guess we'll never know.
Well, he's a representative for New York, in a district for New York City itself. Long Island and "technically" a tiny bit of NYC. (I have been informed that his district is mostly Long Island)
Let's break this down into two parts, okay?
Now I'm not saying we should just give up. Local journalism is important to fight for, and NYC being a corrupt hell-hole isn't a permanent foregone conclusion. However, my point is that NYT employs far fewer reporters than you think to cover an entire country, and the dearth of real local news sources all over the country is contributing to these kind of people succeeding, because the local press is dead in the water and can't afford to send someone researching local corruption.
Pay for your local news, is what I am saying, I guess, and things might marginally improve.
I remember seeing articles about this stuff during his election. Republicans elected him anyway. That's where we are now
The North Shore Leader, a small paper on Long Island, broke the scandal before the November election. By the time other outlets picked it up, Santos had been elected. Grant Lally joined Geoff Bennett to discuss.
Local media does need support.
where tf were the journalists while Santos was running his campaign on these false claims?
There aren't enough journalists to go around. There are hundreds of congresspeople and there definitely aren't hundreds of journalists covering random unimportant congresspeople.
People have voted with their dollars, saying they don't care enough about vetting congresspeople before they're elected to actually pay the salaries of journalists to do that.
Journalism as it used to exist has been absolutely gutted. There's no time for investigation, we need endless content pumped out at faster and faster rates. Who cares what's accurate as long as people click the link and give up that sweet, sweet ad revenue?
There's a reason why there are so many memes about this guy:
How dare you sully the name of Sir Ulrich von Lichtenstein!
Jesus, after all the shit that has been uncovered about this fucker, 114 voted "No" to throw him out?
Investigate those 114 motherfuckers.
It's not rocket science. The only publicly said reason it's never happened before is they want to respect the decision of their constituents. Unofficially, nobody wanted to see themselves on that chopping block.
From a political scientist game theory point of view it's possible that a majority faction of party A throws a minority faction of Party A on the chopping block and Party B obliges them because they think they can pick up those voters.
So yeah, a lot of resistance to actually unseating someone. For good and bad reasons.
Wow it finally happened. Now I wonder if they'll take away his Grammy, 2 Oscar's, MTV Movie Award, Nickelodeon Teen Choice Award, and induction into the Grand Ole Opry.
Wasn't he also a winner of the Beijing Film Festival's coveted Crying Monkey Award?
He never said any of those things. He just didn't correct you when you said them.
I’m glad he’s finally focusing more on being the Green Ranger.
Now convict him of his crimes so he doesn’t have any of the other perks of Congress.
Seven counts of Wire Fraud. He's donezo.
According to factcheck.org
Members of Congress are eligible for a pension at age 62 if they have completed at least five years of service.
He didn't last a year...
You can't just kick a Galactic Emperor out of Congress, WTF?
He's not our Lord zaphod beeble brox, he's one hoopy frood
So there's finally a line: "you must be this shit to get fired". I expect a lot of people toeing up to it.
Well yes and no.
The line was literally defrauding another republican and his mother.
He could have kept on being as shit as he wants to the out-group, just never turn on the in-group, that has always been the line.
Which two Democrats voted against expulsion and which two voted Present?
According to NYT, Robert Scott of VA and Nikema Williams of GA voted No.
Al Green of TX and Jonathan Jackson of IL votes Present
Sheila Jackson Lee (TX), AOC (NY) and Dean Phillips (MN) have no vote recorded
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/12/01/us/politics/santos-expulsion-vote.html
Overall vote tally:
98% (206) of Democrats voted yes (to expell)
1% (2) voted No
1% (2) voted present
49% (105) of Republicans voted to expel
51% (112) of Republicans voted No
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/12/01/us/politics/santos-expulsion-vote.html
[No]
Nikema Williams
Robert C. Scott
[Present]
Jonathan Jackson
Al Green
Their no votes were because they wanted due process and judicial conviction before kicking him out.
“Unfortunately, George Santos won a free and fair election and elections have consequences. He also has not yet been convicted of a crime and the ethics investigation is ongoing. It would be dangerous to set the precedent of expelling a Member of Congress who has not been convicted of a crime. When and if Santos is convicted of these serious offenses an expulsion resolution would be more appropriate. Let’s be clear – we have current members who have been accused of even more egregious crimes while the Republican majority continues to look the other way.”
“The Ethics Committee is charged with investigating alleged wrongdoing by members of the U.S. House of Representatives. In the past, I have been appointed to serve on multiple investigative subcommittees, and I can personally attest to the nonpartisan, rigorous and deliberative process conducted by the committee. In fact, the committee is expected to soon release findings and recommendations on the Santos matter. These resolutions were rushed to the floor outside of that deliberative process. In 2002, I voted to expel Rep. James Traficant but that was after he was found guilty in a court of law. Absent any report or recommendation from the committee, or a criminal conviction, these resolutions are premature. For the sake of the institution, we must stop the cheapening of the censure and expulsion processes for political expediency and get back to the process that we already have in place to appropriately deal with these matters.”
He needs jail time for his theft and fraud.
That's still in the works. Congress doesn't have control over that.
Poor guy, he’s never going to have good work references.
So just like any other government job, it was porn at work that does a person in.
The comment sections are killing me 😭
It's about time!
About fucking time. I'm shocked some Republicans still support the rule of law being used against their own.
Go shit your pants, fuck face.
They did it. Those crazy bastards actually did it.
But did they also expel Anthony Devolder? No, well, he'll take his place on the floor on Monday then, just after he finds his Groucho Marx glasses.
Thoughts and prayers
Glad he is finally gone.