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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Santos: International Man of Mystery

Santos: International Man of Mystery

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To recap, George “Anthony Devolder” Santos (R-NY) has been busted for lies about:

  • Where he went to high school
  • Where he went to college
  • Having bachelor’s and master’s degrees
  • Being a star player on the college volleyball team
  • Working at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup
  • Being the grandson of Holocaust survivors
  • Being the son of a 9/11 victim
  • Running a legit animal rescue charity

There’s also the mystery of where he got all that money after getting bounced from a couple of modestly priced apartments for non-payment of rent, etc.

But the drag queen denial is my favorite in the series so far, maybe because harassing drag queens is the preferred pastime of the humorless prick who is my governor.* When the rumor that Santos had performed in drag in Brazil broke, he huffed the following on Twitter yesterday:

The most recent obsession from the media claiming that I am a drag Queen or “performed” as a drag Queen is categorically false.

The media continues to make outrageous claims about my life while I am working to deliver results.

I will not be distracted nor fazed** by this.

See, drag ain’t George/Anthony’s bag, baybee!

Headline in today’s New York Post:

Video shows drag-denier George Santos dressed in drag, boasting about drag shows

I understand that the presence of a pathological liar like Santos and other assorted lunatics in the House GOP caucus raises concerns about the health of our democracy, but this is some genuinely funny shit, man!

Open thread!

*As some wag pointed out, there is surely at least one Florida drag queen using the stage name Rhonda Santis. My guess is there are several! 

**Astonished kudos to Santos for not spelling this word “phased.” It’s like coming across “ice floe” in the wild! 

Reader Interactions

148Comments

  3. 3.

    Jackie

    He epitomizes what every Republican dreams of getting away with. I’m sure he has a secret fan club.

  5. 5.

    TerryC

    **Astonished kudos to Santos for not spelling this word “phased.” It’s like coming across “ice floe” in the wild! 

    I, too, was taken aback at this rare sighting of that proper spelling.

  6. 6.

    JoyceH

    I can’t help but think that stealing medical funds from a dying dog has to be the worse. And if there’s one, there’s bound to be more.

  8. 8.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Cameron: I was thinking more like the villain in one of those bone-cruncher 1980s action movies – the smarmy type, who struts like a rooster as he sends legions of mooks to get dismantled by the over-steroided hero, but then folds like a camp chair when confronted directly.

  9. 9.

    Josie

    If someone wrote a story about Santos and the whole Republican House of Reps’ approach to governing, no one would publish it. It is too ridiculous to be a good story.

  10. 10.

    Brachiator

    I understand that the presence of a pathological liar like Santos and other assorted lunatics in the House GOP caucus raises concerns about the health of our democracy, but this is some genuinely funny shit, man!

    The GOP version of a big tent includes lots of clowns.

  11. 11.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Josie: That’s the problem with the times we’re living in. Fiction is constrained by the plausible; fact doesn’t have that limitation.

  12. 12.

    Ken

    When I heard about Santos’ denial, I just knew there would be video.  Wish I knew more about online gambling, I might have placed a bet.

  14. 14.

    BigJimSlade

    I forgot all about that Austin Powers scene until I rewatched the movie a couple years ago. It still cracks me up.

    As for Santos, he can nosh on ye olde bag of salted dicks like they were nacho cheese doritos.

  15. 15.

    PaulWartenberg

    There’s reports now about how he defrauded at least one campaign contributor out of $300,000 or so. I mean, it’s on fcking record. Arrest this fraud already! /headdesk

  16. 16.

    oldster

    Add to the list:
    * whether he has the knees he was born with, or replacement knees.

    From all that volleyball.

  19. 19.

    Geminid

    Now that the LaSalle nomination controversy is apparently over, New York writer, professor and twitter commenter Tom Watson has been covering the Santos affair. He quote tweeted someone saying that while Santos’s personal misdeeds matter, the questions about  who chose Santos and who financed him may be more consequential.

    Watson commented: “All roads lead to Lee Zeldin.” Zeldin is a long time Long Island power broker and the Republican candidate for Governor last year.

  20. 20.

    rikyrah

    He’s a phucking crook. Bought and paid for. Time for the investigators, any of them, to put his crooked, paid for azz IN JAIL.

  21. 21.

    Betty Cracker

    @Antonius: It’s alluded to in the second to last bullet, but yeah, the lies about his mother’s death probably deserve two bullet points of their own. IIRC, he claimed she died in her South Tower office on 9/11. Then, when confronted with a GoFundMe he used to raise money for her funeral expenses years later, Santos said she’d escaped her office on 9/11 but had been engulfed in an “ash cloud” that gave her cancer. THEN, it turns out she was in Brazil on 9/11 and had never had a South Tower office anyway.

  23. 23.

    Kent

    @Geminid: It will be interesting to see how many NY Republicans claim never to have known or met Santos.  Probably all of them except when there is photo evidence to the contrary.

    Kind of like how NOW no one actually knew Epstein.  Yet he always had huge parties with lots of rich people in attendance.

  24. 24.

    Tony Jay

    In the movie this is the part Hector Guillén was born to play. Except to make it believable he’s actually a down-on-his-luck croupier desperate to get out of a stale relationship who witnessed a Russian mob hit and adopted the victim’s identity in moment of madness, little knowing the extent of the mistake he’d made.

    While Kevin McCarthy is played by a rusty old boot-scraper from outside a derelict whorehouse on the outskirts of Bakersfield.

  25. 25.

    rikyrah

    I’ve been watching Mannix on MeTV. Got back to the first season. Had no idea that they did an entirely different concept for the show for the first season. Mannix worked in a detective agency that billed itself as ‘ cutting edge’, because they used computers to help them with the information and the cases. They had car phones, and trackers, and an entire IT department to help with cases.

     

    I looked it up and the producers of the show thought that the computer angle was a bit too much and ‘unrelateable’ for the American audience, so that’s why they had Mannix quit and open his own ‘mom and pop’ detective agency, that was the focus of the rest of the seasons.

  26. 26.

    prostratedragon

    @JoyceH: ​Oh yeah. One measure of the man is that he rushed to deny the drag queen business –pretty innocuous to those who don’t hang out with bigots– but made the cruelty to the dog and its owner a throw-in.

  28. 28.

    Geminid

    @PaulWartenberg: I’m not sure which campaign contributor that was. When I hear these reports though, I remind myself that a lot of people who knew Santos was crooked are now protesting that he fooled them.

    It’s not just embarrassment; they are afraid they’ll be dragged down with Santos. In some cases, that fear may be well founded.

  29. 29.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    Also tb added  –

    Where is this woman he married and divorced?

    Was it a green card marriage (for him)?

    Is Santos a US citizen?

  31. 31.

    Geminid

    @Kent: I noticed that a few days ago, Santos’s Twitter heading had a picture of him and Elise Stefanik. Maybe I was being too cynical, but it seemed like a not-so-subtle blackmail hint.

  38. 38.

    Sure Lurkalot

    @Geminid:

    It’s not just embarrassment; they are afraid they’ll be dragged down with Santos.

    You hate to see it (meanwhile searching Costco.com for bigger TV).

  39. 39.

    mrmoshpotato

    **Astonished kudos to Santos for not spelling this word “phased.” It’s like coming across “ice floe” in the wild!

    Now I’m doubting that he wrote the tweet.  I bet he’s lying about that too.

    Also too, I refuse to be phased at this ice flow before me.

  40. 40.

    Van Buren

    Came home last night to find Fiona, my 14 year old Lhasa Apso, shaking uncontrollably. That eventually subsided, but she hasn’t eaten since yesterday morning. Taking her to the vet this evening. Her normal activity level is one notch above hibernation, so I didn’t pick up any hints that something was amiss.

  42. 42.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Geminid:

    I noticed that a few days ago, Santos’s Twitter heading had a picture of him and Elise Stefanik. Maybe I was being too cynical, but it seemed like a not-so-subtle blackmail hint. 

    Is this lying asshole threatening to start telling lies about Stefanik too?

  44. 44.

    Betty Cracker

    Peggy Noonan devoted this week’s WSJ column to “Santos must go!” An excerpt:

    Getting rid of him will “take time,” we are counseled—ethics investigations, campaign finance probes. But the entire Republican leadership, while not quite embracing him, has been happy to use him. He voted for Kevin McCarthy for speaker. He was appointed to two committees.

    They are making a mistake. They should stop, and tell him he has to leave. They should press him to resign. They should dissociate themselves from him, ostracize him.

    They are going this route because they have a majority of five votes and think they can’t afford to lose even one. Especially a particularly malleable one who’ll do anything leadership asks! But in the meantime Mr. Santos is allowed to put his own poisonous imprimatur on all of them, on every initiative and bill, on everything they do.

    If they can’t do the right thing they should at least be practical. He will be used relentlessly by the Democrats, and the media, to make the Republican conference look like a cabal of fraudsters. In the short term he damages their reputation, in the long he will surely cost them seats.

    May that final sentence prove prophetic!

  46. 46.

    p.a.

    Funny & disgusting but Santos is also the squirrel! SQUIRREL! while the Treason Caucus Party starts its reign of (t)error in the House.

  47. 47.

    Poe Larity

    Santos is the prototype for a new generation. He will be seen as mainstream in a few years and retire to Fox.

  50. 50.

    Renie

    Where is this video of Santos as a drag queen?  I’ve only seen pictures.  I’m still waiting to see any confirmation like a long form birth certificate that he is an American citizen.

  51. 51.

    mrmoshpotato

    @West of the Rockies:

    Well, now, who among us hasn’t stolen funds intended for a dying dog’s surgery? 

    Ummm…..hello?  What kind of scumbag doesn’t steal funds intended for a dying dog’s surgery?  It’s as American as stealing apple pie.

  53. 53.

    Roger Moore

    @Betty Cracker:

    He will be used relentlessly by the Democrats, and the media, to make the Republican conference look like a cabal of fraudsters.

    Including, apparently, Peggy Noonan.  Or at least that’s what I get when she says the party is embracing him because they need him.  If you put expedience above principle, you’re the one making that call, not the people who point it out.

  57. 57.

    Wyatt Salamanca

    andrew kaczynski @KFILE

    Researching George Santos for couple weeks now on and off I think this is every name I’ve encountered him use:

    Anthony Santos

    George Santos

    Anthony Devolder

    George Anthony Devolder

    George Devolder

    George A.D. Santos

    Anthony Zabrovsky

    George Anthony Santos-Devolder

    twitter.com/KFILE/status/1616080236143058946

     

     

  58. 58.

    Brachiator

    @Betty Cracker:

    If they can’t do the right thing they should at least be practical. He will be used relentlessly by the Democrats, and the media, to make the Republican conference look like a cabal of fraudsters.

    But the GOP is a cabal of fraudsters. They don’t care that Santos is a political grifter, as long as he votes the right way.

    And the media is enjoying unpeeling the layers of Santos’ crazy past like the layers of an onion.

  61. 61.

    mrmoshpotato

    @lollipopguild:

    I am surprised he does not have a great-grandmother who died on the Titanic. 

    C’mon!  Have some compassion for a guy whose entire family died on the Titanic, the Eastland, and the Lusitania!  You monster!

  62. 62.

    Anyway

    I was told Squeaker McCarthy would be hounded by the press about Santos — is that happening?

    Was surprised to see him named to committees — is that normal for frosh Reps?

  63. 63.

    Poe Larity

    Born in 1988… you remember those rumors about Ronnie and Boys from Brazil? Peggy never denied them.

  64. 64.

    The Moar You Know

    @Van Buren: I am sorry.  14 is definitely past warranty on any dog, sadly.  They just do not live long enough.

    I feel for you and for your pup, and wish you both luck.

  67. 67.

    Kent

    @mrmoshpotato:C’mon!  Have some compassion for a guy whose entire family died on the Titanic, the Eastland, and the Lusitania!  You monster!

    AND in the WTC on 9-11

  69. 69.

    Kent

    @Brachiator:

    But the GOP is a cabal of fraudsters. They don’t care that Santos is a political grifter, as long as he votes the right way.

    I mean, of course.  This is the party that thought Hershel Walker was the most qualified Republican in the whole state of Georgia to serve as their Senator.  And even then, they had to borrow him from Texas.

  71. 71.

    Geminid

    @Anyway: I think McCarthy gets at least one Santos question when he has press events. He’ll keep getting them, I think because Santos will be staying in the news. Journalists are still finding out stuff, and local, state and federal prosecutors are in the mix too.

  74. 74.

    Almost Retired

    Holocaust?  9-11?  Jeez, this guy is like Disaster Zelig.  I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

  75. 75.

    Amir Khalid

    @Betty Cracker:

    James Carville, on the other hand, has said that Santos should be allowed to stay in the House, where Democrats can use him as a piñata for the next two years.

  76. 76.

    Paul in KY

    @Tony Jay: If you’d written this up as a movie script 10 years ago, you’d have been tossed out for it being too unbelievable. Even Netflix would have turfed you.

  78. 78.

    Dangerman

    @Ken: I wonder if I can get a line on whether or not he rips off the mask to reveal he’s either Kang or Kodos. Nothing, even space aliens, would surprise me about now about him.

    Trump and Santos. Bandini Mountain*. Bullshit all the way down.

    * This might be an LA thing.

  79. 79.

    Dangerman

    @Ken: I wonder if I can get a line on whether or not he rips off the mask to reveal he’s either Kang or Kodos. Nothing, even space aliens, would surprise now about him.

    Trump and Santos. Bandini Mountain*. Bullshit all the way down.

    * This might be an LA thing.

  81. 81.

    kalakal

    **Astonished kudos to Santos for not spelling this word “phased.” It’s like coming across “ice floe” in the wild! 

    You’re giving him too much credit. He was talking about how he was offered, but turned down, a major part in Star Trek

  82. 82.

    ...now I try to be amused

    @Almost Retired:

    Holocaust?  9-11?  Jeez, this guy is like Disaster Zelig.  I’d hate to be the candidate who lost to this guy.

    Apparently there is an Irish saying about that guy who always has to one-up you on everything:

    “If you’ve been to Tenerife, he’s been to Elevenerife.”

  83. 83.

    MisterForkbeard

    @Brachiator:

    And the media is enjoying unpeeling the layers of Santos’ crazy past like the layers of an onion.

    Just like Joe Biden, who only informed the government investigative authorities and didn’t immediately light himself on fire in the press when they discovered a few classified papers in an old office of his.

    We can clearly conclude that both sides are the same, and Democrats must jettison Joe Biden so that Republicans should think carefully about some kind of mild pushback on Santos.

  88. 88.

    DaBunny

    @Geminid: Per TPM, at least one of the contributors was a woman on fixed income who gave him $25. He wound up billing her credit card for himself and multiple other NY pols, to the tune of about $9000! She got the extra charges reversed long before he was unmasked, so I’m pretty sure it really was a scam by him and not someone belatedly getting embarassed at who they’d supported

  95. 95.

    Bill Arnold

    @Amir Khalid:

    Democrats can use him as a piñata for the next two years.

    Nah. We’re much better off if McCarthy’s majority gets reduced by 1. (I am a connoisseur of chaos, to be clear.)
    The rest of the GOP house will be writing and acting in, sometimes with video, plenty of campaign advertisements for the Democrats.

  97. 97.

    James E Powell

    In all the articles written about this yutz, nobody brings up the fact that the good & wise people of New York’s 3rd congressional district – D+2 – voted for him. Did they think he’d lower the price of gas? Reduce crime? Make inflation go away? Are they the stupidest voters of this election cycle?

  98. 98.

    lgerard

    There doesn’t seem to be much discussion about his father.

    Is it true that his father is King Charles, who had a torrid affair with his mother when they met in Brazil, only to have their marriage forbidden by Queen Elizabeth?

  101. 101.

    Mike in NC

    Here’s what should happen next: George Santos changes his last name to “DeSantos”, moves to Florida, and announces he’s running for president. Enough idiots would confuse him with that other guy that he’d suck up a few million votes and pocket a ton of money. Win-win!

  103. 103.

    Geminid

    @Amir Khalid: That’s kind of what I want: George Santos twisting in the wind. It would be nice if McCarthy was down a vote because Santos retired. He’s already down one because Florida Representative Steube is out with a bad injury. Reports are that Steube fell 25 feet from a ladder so he won’t be back very soon if ever.

    And Democrats might end a vote up if they win a special election for Santos’s seat. I’m not sure that vote will make a difference on any critical legislation though.

    And Santos’s notoriety rubs off on his colleagues; they will all get asked, should George Santos resign? In light of this new scam being reported, should George Santos be on the Small Business Committee? And I think it’s not a  matter of whether he’s indicted, but when and by how many different prosecutors. And who is indicted besides Santos.

    Republicans are in the majority the first time in four years, and they wanted to start out looking good. But first they went through a protracted and divisive Speaker election, and now the Santos scandal will stay in the news. I’ve likened this to a crew of pirates taking their new pirate ship out for its shakedown cruise with a dead albatross nailed to the mast.

  105. 105.

    trollhattan

    I can’t keep up, is it he’s Jewish/ Jew-ish/ talked to a Jew/ had matzo once?

    The screenwriters are on a crystal bender the likes of which the world has never seen.

  106. 106.

    Amir Khalid

    @Bill Arnold:

    I agree: Santos is a stain on Congress’ good name, his word is no good, and he’s a security risk. He needs to go. He would be a stain on his party’s good name too, if they hadn’t already thrown that away. Carville is the most entertaining political pundir on TV, but he’s clearly wrong about Santos.

  109. 109.

    Roger Moore

    @redactor:

    My pet theory is that Trump and Trumpism are based almost entirely on blackmail.

    I’m not sure about that.  I thought Josh Marshall’s concept of “nonsense debt” is a very good explanation of a lot of Trumpism. Basically, the idea is that the Republican Party has been letting people get away with bullshit for so long, the entire party platform is now BS from top to bottom.  They can’t call someone out for lying, because they risk exposing the extent to which their entire enterprise is built out of the same set of lies.  The net result is that the party is now in the hands of the best (by some measure) liars.

  114. 114.

    James E Powell

    @karen marie:

    We’re finished as a country.  There is no recovering from what Republicans have done and are doing.

    Me & Joe Biden disagree. We say never bet against America.

    All we need to do is elect more & better Democrats, as we used to say at the Great Orange Satan.

  117. 117.

    WaterGirl

    @Betty Cracker:

    In the short term he damages their reputation, in the long he will surely cost them seats.

    That also has potential as a phrase we could repeat to help calm ourselves when the political situation gets to be overwhelming.  Kind of like a mantra!

  118. 118.

    jonas

    @Wyatt Salamanca: Reminds me of this shot in one Simpsons episode showing a list taped to Apu’s cash register at the Kwik-E-Mart:

    Do Not Accept Checks From:
    Chief Wiggum
    Reverend Lovejoy
    Homer J. Simpson
    Homer S. Simpson
    H.J. Simpson
    Homor Simpson
    Homer J. Fong​

  119. 119.

    WaterGirl

    @Paul in KY:

    There will be a book written about how this lunatic got elected to congress.

    Not only that, but we will learn that the person started the book a year ago but didn’t want to share any of the information while it could have impacted the race.  Because if they guy doesn’t win, no one wants to buy your book!

  121. 121.

    Barney

    Perhaps Santos is the first AI robot elected to Congress. It’s an acknowledged problem with AI that it frequently tells lies when asked to explain something, but it can be easily programmed to get spelling and grammar right, all the time.

  122. 122.

    BlueGuitarist

    US Rep. Bill Foster (D-IL)
     

    As the only recipient of the Wilson Prize for High-Energy Particle Accelerator Physics serving in Congress, it can get lonely. Not anymore!
    I’m thrilled to be joined on the Science Committee by my Republican colleague Dr. George Santos, winner of not only the Nobel Prize, but also the Fields Medal – the top prize in Mathematics – for his groundbreaking work with imaginary numbers.

    @RepBillFoster

  123. 123.

    Steeplejack

    Somewhere in the Santos-in-drag coverage on Twitter I saw my new favorite drag queen name: Flotilla DeBarge. Genius!

  126. 126.

    randy khan)

    I was so startled to see the correct spelling of “fazed” that I briefly thought it was wrong.

    But I think this is evidence that a staffer wrote the tweet.

  127. 127.

    Steeplejack

    @Cheryl from Maryland:

    Santos was born in New York, according to a couple of newspaper stories when all of this stuff first started hitting the fan. I don’t think we’ve seen the long-form birth certificate that Republicans prize so much, though. 🤔

  130. 130.

    trollhattan

    @Barney: Good one!

    Would the lie be, “I failed the Turing test” or “I passed the Turing test”? I feel like Spock arguing with an alien computer.

  132. 132.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Kent:

    C’mon! Have some compassion for a guy whose entire family died on the Titanic, the Eastland, and the Lusitania! You monster!

    AND in the WTC on 9-11

    Not to mention the Hindenburg and the Edmund Fitzgerald.

  134. 134.

    Geminid

    I typically look up something like  “Santos Intrater” or “Santos Stefanik” because these relationships seem important.

    I looked up just George Santos a couple hours ago and as soon as I typed in G and e, google listed “George Santos US Congressman” before even I got to o.

    There’s a lot of interest in this guy.

  137. 137.

    Interstadial

    Reverse floe vs. flow:

    In a long-ago article that mentioned a glacier (which is in fact an ice flow), the author called it a floe.  Sigh…

  140. 140.

    Brachiator

    @Interstadial:

    In a long-ago article that mentioned a glacier (which is in fact an ice flow), the author called it a floe.

    Ice Floe. Good name for a drag queen.

  141. 141.

    redactor

    @Roger Moore: i agree that the nonsense debt and hate debt that Marshall describes explain much of Trump’s support among the Republican base. The rapid conversion of the (surviving) old guard feels different, though. The July 4 visit to Moscow, Lindsay Graham’s sudden shift from McCain ally to raving Trump defender, the Putin worship, and the election denialism seem to point in another direction. When Cawthorn got too far over his skis, the ensuing revelations were devastating and remarkably quick.

  142. 142.

    Roger Moore

    @trollhattan:

    Would the lie be, “I failed the Turing test” or “I passed the Turing test”?

    The lie would be “I’m a control for the Turing test”.  The test as originally proposed by Turing had a questioner, a human control, and the computer program.  The goal is to see if the computer can fool a skeptical questioner who was warned in advance they will be trying to tell a computer from a human.

  143. 143.

    Brachiator

    The New Yorker Radio Hour podcast has a story about how a local paper, The North Shore Leader, printed stories about Santos being such a known liar that people referred to him as “George Scam-tos.” But nobody seemed to pay attention.

    Some GOP people of influence figured, “what the hell, he’s a fraud, but he’s our fraud “and it was off to the races.

  145. 145.

    WaterGirl

    Couldn’t some staffer put up a “Congratulations to the First Drag Queen Elected to the House!” sign?  Santos couldn’t complain without admitting that he’s the drag queen.

    *not that there’s anything wrong with that, unless you are a total fucking lying hypocrite.

  146. 146.

    Ruckus

    @Tony Jay:

    While Kevin McCarthy is played by a rusty old boot-scraper from outside a derelict whorehouse on the outskirts of Bakersfield.

    Isn’t that who/what Kevin actually is?

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