Oct. 10 (UPI) — Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., is facing 23 new federal charges, including identity theft, after being charged earlier this year with wire fraud, money laundering and theft.
Federal prosecutors announced the new charges Tuesday in a superseding indictment, alleging Santos was involved in a credit card scheme that charged campaign contributors’ cards repeatedly, often exceeding FEC contribution limits.
“As alleged, Santos is charged with stealing peoples’ identities and making charges on his own donors’ credit cards without their authorization, lying to the FEC and, by extension, the public about the financial state of his campaign,” Breon Peace, U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement.
According to the indictment, Santos was charged Tuesday with “two counts of wire fraud, two counts of making materially false statements to the Federal Election Committee, two counts of falsifying records submitted to obstruct the FEC, two counts of aggravated identity theft and one count of access device fraud.”
Santos, who admitted to lying about his qualifications after he was elected to his House seat, pleaded not guilty in May to a 13-count indictment. That indictment included seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds and two counts of making false statements to the House of Representatives.
Last week, Santos’ former campaign treasurer Nancy Marks pleaded guilty to federal charges. Prosecutors allege Marks falsely claimed that relatives had donated to Santos’ campaign in order to inflate the amount of funds needed to qualify for national party support.
Santos, who is due back in court on Oct. 27, refuses to resign from Congress and is running for re-election in 2024. Santos has called his indictment “a witch hunt.”
On Tuesday, Long Island Democrat Thomas Suozzi announced his campaign to challenge Santos and retake his former congressional seat, which he held for three terms.
In a statement on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, Suozzi said, “The madness in Washington, D.C., and the absurdity of George Santos remaining in the United States Congress is obvious to everyone.”
