At least seven states, federal and congressional entities are looking into George Santos

At least seven state, federal, and congressional bodies have received formal complaints about Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) or are said to be looking into him as questions about his background and finances keep coming up.

The New York Republican has said that parts of his resume were made up.

Lawmakers from both parties have asked Santos to step down because of the growing controversy, but the congressman says he hasn’t done anything wrong and is still planning to finish his term representing New York’s 3rd Congressional District.

“Let me be very clear: I’m not leaving, I’m not hiding, and I’m not giving up,” Santos wrote on Twitter Tuesday. “I will keep working for #NY03 no matter what people say on Twitter. I can’t wait to get everything done that needs to be done!”

Here are the groups that have received complaints about the congressman or started looking into him:

Groups are looking into Santos

The District Attorney for Nassau County.

In December, the Nassau County district attorney’s office said it was looking into Santos. This came after The New York Times published a story about his background that raised some questions.

Since then, more evidence has come to light that shows Santos made up parts of his past, such as his religion, work history, and education.

When The Hill asked for an update this week, the office of the district attorney, which is run by a Republican, pointed to a statement it made in December.

At the time, Nassau County District Attorney Anne T. Donnelly said, “The many lies and contradictions that Congressman-Elect Santos has told are nothing short of shocking.” “The people who live in Nassau County and other parts of the third district need a representative in Congress who is honest and responsible. No one is above the law, and if someone broke the law in this county, we will go after them.

Eastern District of New York U.S. Attorney’s Office

Multiple sources said in December that the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York was looking into Santos’s finances and financial disclosures.

This investigation now seems to be looking into whether Santos was part of a plan to steal thousands of dollars from a fundraiser for a dying service dog of a veteran.

Richard Osthoff, a U.S. Navy veteran, and Michael Boll, a retired police sergeant, both told Patch.com last month that Santos helped raise money for Osthoff’s dog’s surgery through a GoFundMe. But they said that when the fund got to $3,000, Santos shut it down and left.

Osthoff told Politico earlier this month that two agents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York had talked to him about the incident. He gave the agents text messages that he and Santos had sent to each other in 2016.

When asked about the Politico report earlier this month, Santos said, “It’s clear they talk more to you guys than to my legal team.”

He also said, “I can’t tell you anything because they don’t talk to us.”

This week, The Hill asked the U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of New York if they had started an investigation into Santos. The office did not answer.

The lawyer for the state of New York

The office of the New York state attorney general told The Hill that it is “looking into some of the issues that have been raised” about Santos, but it would not say what issues are being looked into.

The District Attorney for Queens

In January, the Queens district attorney’s office told the Queens Chronicle that it was looking into whether or not District Attorney Melinda Katz (D) has the power to handle any accusations against Santos.

Katz’s office told the outlet, “As a rule, we don’t comment on open investigations. However, we are looking into whether Queens County has jurisdiction over any possible crimes.”

When The Hill asked for a comment this week, the office said, “Our statement hasn’t changed.”

Brazilian prosecutors

Reports say that Brazil’s police have started looking into Santos again for a crime that happened in 2008.

Last month, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office in Rio de Janeiro told The New York Times that the office planned to officially ask the Justice Department to tell Santos about the charges against him.

According to Brazilian court records cited by the Times, Santos stole a checkbook from a man his mother cared for when he was 19 years old in 2008. Then, using the checkbook and a fake name, Santos allegedly bought illegal things worth almost $700, like a pair of shoes.

He told police in 2010 that he had done the crime, and in 2011 a judge gave the go-ahead to charge him. The Brazilian prosecutor and the court both told the newspaper that the case was still not over.

In December, Santos told The New York Post, “I am not a criminal here, in Brazil, or anywhere else in the world.”

Groups are likely to look into the Santos House Ethics Committee.

After getting two complaints about Santos, it is likely that the House Ethics Committee will start an investigation into him. The panel, on the other hand, hasn’t been officially set up yet, so it can’t start a probe.

Reps. Ritchie Torres and Daniel Goldman, both Democrats from New York, filed an ethics complaint against Santos in January. They said that he had not filed timely, accurate, and complete reports about his finances.

The complaint focused on Santos’s claim that he made more than $1 million in dividends from his company, the Devolder Organization, every year. It also said that Santos’s financial data company, Dun & Bradstreet, thought the company made $43,688 as of July 20, 2022.

When asked about the complaint the day it was filed, Santos said, “I haven’t done anything wrong.” He also said, “They can do whatever they want.”

In a separate complaint to the Ethics Committee this month, a person who wanted to work for Santos said that he had done sexually inappropriate things. Derek Myers also asked for an ethics investigation “into the violation of letting a volunteer work at the office and giving the volunteer work that should have been done by paid staff with the promise of future work.” He put a copy of the complaint about Ethics on Twitter.

Santos said that the sexual misconduct claims are “laughable” and that he denies them “one hundred percent.”

Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) has not asked Santos to resign. Last month, he told reporters, “If there is a concern and he has to go through the Ethics Committee, let him do that.”

Last week, things got crazy when the Speaker told CNN that the panel was looking into the congressman. Soon after, though, he took back what he said and said that what he meant to say was that people have complained about Santos.

“There are questions. When asked if he thought the panel would look into Santos, he said, “I expect them to be answered.”

It’s not clear when the 118th Congress’s official work will start because the Ethics Committee hasn’t set a date for getting things set up. House rules say that at the start of a new Congress, committees must hold an open meeting to set rules before they can start doing official business.

In 2021, the panel’s first meeting was on February 25, in 2019 it was on February 27, and in 2017 it was on March 9.

Groups that have a complaint about Santos Federal Elections Commission (FEC)

A nonpartisan ethics watchdog called the Campaign Legal Center filed a complaint against Santos with the FEC in January. The complaint said that the first-term congressman and his 2022 campaign committee had broken federal campaign finance laws.

The group said that Santos took part in a scheme to hide the source of a loan he gave to his campaign. They also said that he lied about numbers on his disclosure reports and used campaign money for personal reasons.

Court records show that Fox News hosts and executives privately criticized Trump’s claims of election fraud that were broadcast on the network.

The US tells people in New Mexico to kill wild cows.

When asked this week if the agency has started looking into Santos, the FEC told The Hill that it “cannot disclose any information about a potential or existing enforcement matter until after the matter has been resolved” because of “the confidentiality requirements surrounding the enforcement process.”

But at the end of last month, The Washington Post said that the Justice Department asked the FEC to hold off on taking action against Santos because prosecutors were already looking into a similar crime. Two people who know about the matter told the Post that the request came from the Public Integrity Section of the Justice Department.