Embattled lawmaker George Santos assigned to two House committees
Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) will be seated on the House Small Business Committee and the Science, Space and Technology Committee, according to a steering committee member and GOP aide who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly.
Santos flipped a seat on Long Island and helped give Republicans a narrow majority in the House but was later revealed to have lied about much of his biography.
Earlier Tuesday, Rep. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) called for the Federal Election Commission to investigate Santos’s campaign finances.
“Where did all the money come from?” Torres said at a news conference Tuesday in Great Neck, N.Y., in Santos’s 3rd Congressional District.
Santos reported lending his campaign $700,000 before winning the House seat. Since that November victory, reporting by several news organizations found that much of what Santos said about his life is either false or has not been corroborated.
The Washington Post also reported that Santos claimed the cousin of a Russian oligarch as a client.
In a letter to the FEC on Tuesday, Torres focused on Redstone Strategies, which according to the New York Times is an “independent expenditure committee” with the “singular purpose of electing Mr. Santos.” But the FEC has said that group is not registered with the FEC as required. Torres, in his letter, wrote that “would be illegal under federal law.”
Torres represents New York’s 15th Congressional District, which includes the Bronx.
Torres’s call comes a week after the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint with the FEC that accused Santos of wide-ranging campaign finance violations. The alleged wrongdoing includes masking the true source of his campaign’s funding, misrepresenting his campaign’s spending and using campaign resources to cover personal expenses.
Santos has admitted to lying on his résumé but has rebuffed calls to resign. Republicans in New York have called on Santos to resign immediately, but House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has balked, saying Santos was legally elected and seated without objection.
In addition to Santos’s committee assignments, two Republican lawmakers who were previously expelled from House committees over their extremist or violent remarks have been given committee assignments again, days after McCarthy won the gavel.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) will be seated on the House Homeland Security Committee, and Rep. Paul A. Gosar (R-Ariz.) will be seated on the House Natural Resources Committee, according to two people familiar with the assignments who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the decisions.