Rep. Michael Guest, the chair of the House Ethics Committee, has filed an expulsion resolution against Rep. George Santos, and that vote—to be held after the Thanksgiving recess—looks likely to succeed if Santos doesn’t resign first. So far, Santos has been defiant, saying he won’t run for reelection in 2024 but calling the Ethics Committee report “a disgusting politicized smear that shows the depths of how low our federal government has sunk.” But a series of lawmakers who voted against expelling Santos at the beginning of the month are now saying they’ll vote “yes” this time around.
That includes Rep. Susan Wild, the ranking Democrat on the Ethics Committee, who said, “I intend to vote yes on any privileged expulsion resolution that is brought forward, as the work of the Committee is now complete, and I am no longer obligated to maintain neutrality.” Axios reported that as of Thursday afternoon, Wild was one of 19 Democrats and nearly a dozen Republicans who were flipping their votes to support expulsion, which would require all 213 Democrats and 77 Republicans.
One unnamed House Republican told Axios, “He's gone.” And an unnamed senior House Republican told Punchbowl News, “I think he’s toast.”
Given that the report showed Santos allegedly funneling tens of thousands of dollars from his campaign to his own bank accounts in multiple ways, using his campaign credit card on things like Botox and trips to Atlantic City and Las Vegas, and filing a list of fake donor information (using real people’s names without their permission), it doesn’t seem like a tough call.
Some Republicans, though, are hesitating to expel Santos for one key reason: As Rep. Troy Nehls put it, “why would we want to expel a guy ... [when] we've got a three-seat, four-seat majority. What are we doing?” Nehls is waiting for more than just the Ethics Committee report, saying, “I think until he's convicted, I'm going to hold off.” Since Santos doesn’t go to trial until September 2024, that’s giving him quite a lot of leeway—and helping to preserve a narrow Republican majority until nearly the end of this Congress. That’s how Republicans operate: Narrow partisan interests first, even if it means you’re showing how corrupt your party is.
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