Former Rep. George Santos (R-NY) has been sentenced to more than 7 years in prison for wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
“From his creation of a wholly fictitious biography to his callous theft of money from elderly and impaired donors, Santos’s unrestrained greed and voracious appetite for fame enabled him to exploit the very system by which we select our representatives,” prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum obtained by NBC News.
Santos’ “conduct, though involving dishonesty and abuse of trust, stemmed largely from a misguided desperation related to his political campaign, rather than inherent malice,” his attorneys wrote in a court filing, adding, “Moreover, the public nature of this case and Mr. Santos’s fall from a position of public trust serve as a stark warning to others who might contemplate similar offenses.”
Upon pleading guilty to the charges last summer, Santos said, “I offer my deepest apologies.” He noted that he “cannot rewrite the past, but I can control the road ahead.”
“Pleading guilty is a step I never imagined I’d take, but it is a necessary one because it is the right thing to do,” he stated. “It’s not only a recognition of my misrepresentation to others, but more profoundly, it is my own recognition of the lies I told myself over these past years.”
Santos was expelled from Congress in 2023 after a House Ethics Committee Report claimed he filed false reports with the Federal Election Commission and used campaign funds for personal items. The report said that Santos “continues to flout his statutory financial disclosure obligations and has failed to correct countless errors and omissions in his past FD Statements, despite being repeatedly reminded by the ISC and the Committee of his requirement to do so.”
