George Santos, a disgraced former member of the US House of Representatives, has been sentenced to more than seven years in prison, bringing an end to an extraordinary controversy that began with a fraudulent congressional campaign.
Santos lied extensively about his life story both before and after entering the US Congress, where he was the first openly LGBTQ+ Republican elected to the body. He was ultimately convicted of defrauding donors.
The 36-year-old was sentenced on Friday morning in Long Island, the large suburban area to the east of New York City.
He sobbed in court saying he was “humbled” and “chastised” and realised he had betrayed his constituents’ trust. He pleaded guilty last summer to federal wire fraud and aggravated identity theft and had appealed for mercy.
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“I offer my deepest apologies,” he said on Friday, adding: “I cannot rewrite the past, but I can control the road ahead.”
US district court judge Joanna Seybert appeared unconvinced by his display of contrition.
“Where is your remorse? Where do I see it?” she asked as she sentenced him to 87 months.
She said the former politician appeared to feel that “it’s always someone else’s fault”.
Santos served in Congress for barely a year before his House of Representatives colleagues ousted him in 2023. Having flipped his seat to the GOP it then reverted to the Democrats with Tom Suozzi winning the vacant spot in a special election in February of last year.
Santos admitted to deceiving donors and stealing the identities of nearly a dozen people, including his family members, to fund his winning campaign.
He also made up strings of fantastical stories about his life, identity and experiences.
One of four Republicans to flip House seats in New York during the 2022 midterm elections, Santos campaigned on his fealty to Donald Trump’s movement.
He spoke glowingly of the January 6th, 2021, attack on the Capitol by the former president’s supporters, saying he had attended himself and that Trump had been “at his full awesomeness that day.” He later called January 6th a “dark day” and denied that he had been present.
Before Santos was even sworn into office, news reports revealed that much of his resume and many of his campaign trail claims about his background had been outright lies.
His lies ranged from strangely trivial claims — that he had played volleyball in college and undergone two knee replacements — to fundamental falsehoods about his background — that he had personal ties to the Holocaust, 9/11 and the Pulse nightclub shooting in Orlando, Florida.
During his court case he frequently held press gatherings and mocked the media and his detractors, saying he was being smeared.
Santos was shown to have spent donor money on holidays, luxury goods, Botox treatment and the website OnlyFans.
Shortly before being elected to the US House of Representatives in New York’s third congressional district, Santos was first accused of deceiving voters by the North Shore Leader, a local newspaper in Long Island, which accused him of fabricating much of his resume.
Santos’s sentencing was not without controversy. Before his court appearance on Friday, he referred to himself as a “scapegoat” on social media, in reference to prosecutors accusing him of organising the fraudulent conspiracy.
He also alleged that the justice department was a “cabal of pedophiles”, in posts on social media platform X.
Prosecutors highlighted Santos’s comments in a filing after his defence team requested a two-year prison sentence. He later defended his remarks, saying he was “profoundly sorry” for his crimes but that a seven-year prison sentence was too harsh.
“Every sunrise since that plea has carried the same realisation: I did this, me. I am responsible,” he wrote. “But saying I’m sorry doesn’t require me to sit quietly while these prosecutors try to drop an anvil on my head.”
Santos pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in August. Prosecutors, at the time, highlighted his plea as the first time he had “told the truth about his criminal schemes”.
“For what may seem like the first time since he started his campaign for Congress, Mr Santos told the truth about his criminal schemes. He admitted to lying, stealing and conning people,” said Breon Peace, the US attorney for the eastern district of New York, in a statement.
“By pleading guilty, Mr Santos has acknowledged that he repeatedly defrauded federal and state government institutions as well as his own family, supporters and constituents. His flagrant and disgraceful conduct has been exposed and will be punished. Mr Santos’s conviction demonstrates this office’s enduring commitment to rooting out corruption and grift by public officials.”
At the time, Santos faced 22 years in prison. As part of the plea agreement, he was forced to pay more than $373,000 (€328,294) in restitution and to forfeit more than $205,000 (€180,405). – Guardian Service
