Federal prosecutors have filed criminal charges against Republican congressman George Santos.
The New York representative, who has been the subject of several investigations over his personal and campaign finances, was charged in Brooklyn on Tuesday (May 9), according to CNN.
The nature of the freshman lawmaker’s charges remain under seal, but they will be disclosed once he appears in an Eastern District federal court, which could be as early as Wednesday.
The 34-year old was elected to represent New York’s 3rd Congressional District in November last year, before a New York Times investigation found that he had fabricated several matters including the college he attended and his employment by Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. Santos later apologised for his ‘résumé embellishment’, but refused to resign from office.
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The same investigation, meanwhile, found he had also lied about a lack of online presence of the company that paid his $750,000 salary – and that his claim that he lost four employees in an Orlando nightclub shooting in 2016 were simply untrue.
And in somewhat bizarre circumstances, Santos also falsely declared he had worked as a producer on Broadway’s Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, as well as insisting his mother survived the 9/11 terror attack in 2001, when in fact she wasn’t even in the country at the time according to immigration documents.
Local citizens subsequently held regular protests outside his campaign office and called on party leaders to give him the boot from Congress, but to no avail.
In a further controversy, Santos was accused of sexual harassment and ethics violations by a prospective congressional aide earlier this year. Derek Myers, who briefly worked in the representative’s office, made the claims in a letter he sent to the House Committee on Ethics.
In the letter, posted on Twitter, Myers claimed he was alone with Santos in his office on January 25.
On the date, he alleged the congressman asked him whether he had a profile on Grindr, a popular LGBT+ dating app.
Then, he claimed Santos invited him to karaoke and touched his groin, assuring him that his husband was out of town. Myers says he declined the alleged advance and promptly left Santos’ office.
