Congressman-elect George Santos has admitted to a long list of lies about his background, saying, “We do stupid things in life.”
The 34-year-old New York Republican says that despite having fabricated his education, his work history, and lied about his real-estate holdings, and hiding a marriage, he intends to take office.
“This will not deter me from having good legislative success. I will be effective. I will be good,” he told the New York Post.
The New York Times uncovered the holes in Santos’ resume, and The Daily Beast found that he had been married to a woman from 2012 to 2017 despite declaring that he is openly gay and “never had an issue with my sexual identity in the past decade.”
“I dated women in the past. I married a woman. It’s personal stuff,” Santos told the Post. “I’m very much gay. I’m OK with my sexuality. People change. I’m one of those people who change.”
Although Santos claims he is coming clean, he was still defending some of his howlers.
He called his lie about working for Citigroup and Goldman Sachs a “poor choice of words” because he worked for another company that did business with both.
And he claimed a silent hyphen explains his false declaration of Jewish heritage.
“I never claimed to be Jewish,” he said. “I am Catholic. Because I learned my maternal family had a Jewish background I said I was ‘Jew-ish.’”
Among Santos’ other belated disclosures: He never graduated from college despite saying he had a diploma from Baruch, he does not own any property despite bragging that he owned 13, and he still owes $12,000 in back rent a judge ordered him to pay.
“I completely forgot about it,” he said.
While he copped to many of the whoppers, he denied the Times report that he faced a criminal charge in Brazil.
“I am not a criminal here—not here or in Brazil or any jurisdiction in the world,” he told the Post. “Absolutely not. That didn’t happen.”
Republicans have largely given Santos a pass on his cascade of fibs, with several noting that Sen. Richard Blumenthal had been caught exaggerating his military service. But numerous Democrats have called out Santos—Rep. Ted Lieu demanded he resign—and New York State Attorney General Tish James is reportedly looking into whether any laws were broken.
