The chairman of the House Ethics Committee announced Friday he has filed a resolution to force a vote on expelling Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., from Congress, one day after the committee issued a withering report detailing substantial evidence that Santos converted campaign donations for his own personal use.
Santos easily survived an expulsion vote earlier this month as lawmakers in both parties stressed the need to allow due process, as Santos is also facing nearly two dozen charges in federal court. But the release of the committee’s findings has generated new momentum for ousting the scandal-plagued freshman. Shortly after the report was released, Santos announced he would not seek reelection.
“The evidence uncovered in the Ethics Committee’s Investigative Subcommittee investigation is more than sufficient to warrant punishment and the most appropriate punishment, is expulsion,” said Rep. Michael Guest, R-Miss.
Guest emphasized in his statement that he was filing the expulsion resolution separate from the committee process and was doing so in his personal capacity as a member of the House. Several other members of the Ethics panel have also come out in favor of expulsion now that the investigation is complete.
Santos assailed the committee’s report in a tweet on X as a “disgusting politicized smear.” He said he will have a press conference on the Capitol steps on Nov. 30. The vote on whether to expel him is likely to take place before then.
The Ethics panel appointed to investigate Santos met nine times over the course of its investigation, interviewed more than 40 witnesses and authorized 37 subpoenas. Among the most damaging of the allegations was that he used campaign donations to pay for stays in Atlantic City and the Hamptons and to pay for a Botox treatment at a local spa.
