A total of 31 Democrats joined 182 Republicans in voting to keep Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) in Congress, killing a Republican-led effort to oust the embattled lawmaker. The lower chamber on Wednes…
A total of 31 Democrats joined 182 Republicans in voting to keep Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) in Congress, killing a Republican-led effort to oust the embattled lawmaker.
The lower chamber on Wednesday voted 179-213-19 on a resolution to expel Santos, marking the second unsuccessful attempt this year to eject the first-term lawmaker from the House. A two-thirds threshold is needed to expel a member of Congress.
A total of 31 Democrats and 182 Republicans voted against the resolution, while 24 Republicans and 155 Democrats voted to expel Santos.
The effort to oust Santos was spearheaded by a group of freshman New York Republicans — led by Rep. Anthony D’Esposito — who moved last week to force a vote to expel Santos in the wake of his mounting legal battles. D’Esposito called the legislation to the floor as a privileged resolution, a procedural gambit that forces leadership to set a vote within two legislative days.
Santos faces a total of 23 federal charges ahead of his trial, slated to begin in September 2024.
He pled not guilty last week to a set of 10 new criminal charges in a superseding indictment alleging he inflated his campaign finance reports and charged his donors’ credit cards without authorization.
In May, he was charged on 13 counts of misleading donors, fraudulently receiving unemployment benefits and lying on House financial disclosures.
Santos admitted earlier this year to embellishing parts of his background while campaigning, but he has reiterated he will not resign despite his legal troubles.
Here are the 31 Democratic House members who voted to keep Santos in Congress:
They're just waiting on a report from the Committee on Ethics (like they probably should). I know Santos' guilt seems obvious but that can't be the standard; Joe Biden's guilt on every crime ever conceived "seems obvious" to the MAGA insurrectionists in our government. The Committee on Ethics says we should hear from them within the next two weeks.
The ISC has contacted approximately 40 witnesses, reviewed more than 170,000 pages of documents, and authorized 37 subpoenas. The Committee’s nonpartisan staff and the ISC Members have put countless hours into this investigation, which has been a priority for the investigative team and involved a significant amount of the Committee’s resources.
The Committee will announce its next course of action in this matter on or before November 17, 2023.
Yes, and it's also important to follow up with the fact that even if 100% of Democrats had voted to expel him. It still would have not been enough. 90% of Republicans voted not to expel him. And Republicans have the majority.
Doesn't matter they're wearing this stain and they can't shake him. Last time we did this yeah we got trump and now he's the weakest candidate in the general election in history almost.
No one else has been a convicted felon and running for pres.
If Santos's guilt is only obvious to his political opposition then the vote would fail on its own with no help needed from Democrats (2/3rds threshold). Democrats aren't going to get kicked out of office because MAGAs are crazy.
Santos's complete lack of ethics isn't some big question that needs a thorough investigation to objectively consider. He just straight up lied about his life, with no real excuse or counter. This idea that only a special report could possibly confirm someone shouldn't be a representative is just standard congressional cowardice.
He hasn’t actually been convicted of anything yet, and due process, etc.
Dems tried to have him expelled months earlier and Repubs shut it down completely
His trial begins during the height of 2024 election season
Dems seem to have adopted a larger strategy of “fine, then you will reap what you sow” philosophy against the Repubs and those who vote for them (i.e., House speaker elections, etc)
Everything goes to Hell in a hand basket and chaos reigns supreme in the US, electorate says enough is enough, and Dems sweep elections in 2024.
Dems seem to have adopted a larger strategy of “fine, then you will reap what you sow” philosophy against the Repubs and those who vote for them (i.e., House speaker elections, etc)
So far it seems like the entire country is reaping a lot of what the Repubs have sown while Dems continue to play from the "high ground" playbook. (i.e., Roe, Book Bans, Anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, etc)
I'd like to respect them for it, but it's starting to wear a little thin.
Everything goes to Hell in a hand basket and chaos reigns supreme in the US, electorate says enough is enough, and Dems sweep elections in 2024.
If that's the plan, they are standing by while a lot of folks are hurt to get that sweep. It better pan out, and they better do something with it.
Congress has rarely resorted to the most extreme punishment at its disposal. The House has expelled only five members in its history — three during the Civil War and two after their convictions on public corruption charges. It would be groundbreaking for the House to kick out Santos before his case in federal court is resolved.
There's not really an established precedent for booting Congress members out before a conviction. So, while I agree he's a 10/10 shitbag, I think there's value of letting due process play out and then kick him to the curb.
The only hypothesis I think works is he is an electoral liability. Keeping him there provides ammunition during the election and means the GOP can't get a better candidate.
The guy is a massive fucknuckle.
I think the Democrat strategy this cycle is pretty much this on even a larger scale. The right wing says they're timing trump's trials to interfere with the election, but the thing is I think they're right in the exact opposite way of what they expect.
Trump caught the US by surprise and now people are sick of him, so suddenly he and every other scumbag in his party are the best ammunition the dems could ask for. The dems want to keep them all around and actively give them more chances to be obnoxious in order to scare more voters toward voting blue while splitting the GOP's votes.
Democrat Rep. Tlaib wasn't censured over remarks about Israel yesterday when 23 republicans surprisingly voted against the resolution. That's probably why dems, in turn, voted to not toss Santos.
So is our country being run by blackmailers? Is this why we can’t clean up our government, they are all being blackmailed to do this shit, or the puppeteer will cut the strings and leak video of them doing something heinous? Cause wtf? Al Franken stepped down because of inappropriate behavior, but lying is perfectly acceptable?
Franken willingly resigned of his own accord. This fucker is too craven to do so.
I understand why they want to wait, then though I'd prefer him yeeted. He's been indicted, but not found guilty. I don't think the House ethics committee has released a final ruling either.
A total of 31 Democrats joined 182 Republicans in voting to keep Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) in Congress, killing a Republican-led effort to oust the embattled lawmaker.
The lower chamber on Wednesday voted 179-213-19 on a resolution to expel Santos, marking the second unsuccessful attempt this year to eject the first-term lawmaker from the House.
The effort to oust Santos was spearheaded by a group of freshman New York Republicans — led by Rep. Anthony D’Esposito — who moved last week to force a vote to expel Santos in the wake of his mounting legal battles.
Santos faces a total of 23 federal charges ahead of his trial, slated to begin in September 2024.
In May, he was charged on 13 counts of misleading donors, fraudulently receiving unemployment benefits and lying on House financial disclosures.
Santos admitted earlier this year to embellishing parts of his background while campaigning, but he has reiterated he will not resign despite his legal troubles.
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The vote was an attempt to expel without waiting for due process to run its course. There is an ethics investigation that will wrap up in under 2 weeks.
Many of the democrats who voted not to expel did so because they didn't want to see a new precedent set in congress where the body can expel a member without some form of due process. If all it takes is a vote to eject someone, then the party in power would be able to expell at will, and that would be bad for everyone.
Also, republicans were trying to get rid of him as a publicity stunt to look better for the Nov 2023 elections running across the country and wanted to be able to pull this stunt off to make themselves look better to help their regional elections.
The democrat holdouts are eager to expel just as soon as the ethics investigation is complete. Those holdout democrats are playing 4d chess and winning. They made the right call.
This is a motion in response to his legal troubles not whether he is guilty of them or not.
I feel like we really need to have some sort of yearly national civics competency/refresher course. So many in the USA have disengaged with the process of governance.