Here’s some of the local coverage.
Nassau Republicans Urge George Santos to Resign (longislandpress.com)
Rep. Santos quickly dismisses Nassau GOP’s call for him to resign (news12.com)
Nassau GOP To LI Rep. George Santos: ‘Immediately Resign’ | Mineola, NY Patch
And a NY Times gift link:
Is anyone here a Newsday subscriber and do they have gift links?
Don’t know if the link will work for non-subscribers but here goes
And Queens is checking in
The Newsday link opens the article but after a few seconds it fades out and this box appears:
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What a co-worker does sometimes to share Newsday articles via email is to save them as .pdf files and attach them, but I’m not sure how she does this.
BTW some of the articles feature Bruce Blakeman more prominently than others. I have to say that I didn’t know much about Blakeman until he was elected, and haven’t been happy with his lack of support for vaccination (unlike our past County Executive) and his anti-masking stance (Nassau Community College announced last month that due to the rise in Covid rates, masks would be required on campus, but within hours Blakeman forced them to walk it back to a recommendation). For some reason he’s decided to stand up vs. Santos.
One factoid about Blakeman: his 1st wife was Nancy Shevell, who’s now married to Paul McCartney.
Let’s say he resigned or is removed somehow. Would the (Democratic) governor be free to appoint whoever she wants to replace him? Most likely, that would be a Democrat.
This might work
George Santos must resign, Nassau Republicans say, but Santos digs in - Newsday.pdf (4.9 MB)
The Constitution requires that vacancies in the House be filled through an election. In the first session of any Congress, all states, territories, and districts mandate a special election in case of a vacancy in any House seat. If the vacancy occurs during the second session, requirements differ based on the length of time between when the vacancy occurs and the next general election.
The process for filling House vacancies is distinct from that of filling vacancies in the U.S. Senate, where 37 states fill vacancies through gubernatorial appointment and the remaining 13 require a special election. - SOURCE
Yes the pdf works thanks!
Here’s an interesting quote:
Rina Shah, a Washington D.C.-based Republican strategist who previously worked as a senior congressional aide, told Newsday in an interview “[House Speaker Kevin] McCarthy must decide whether Santos remains, but for a party that ran on delivering results — keeping this con man in their ranks does them no favors.”
It might be better in the long run for the Repubs to keep Santos.
The choruses of “What did he do that was so wrong? What?! WHAT?!” will normalize his misdeeds. So when they nominate someone even worse (and we all know that that will happen) the base and the swing voters they’re targeting will be softened up a little more. They’ve been doing this for decades.
Also, with all the current Republican infighting, Dwight Eisenhower’s memorable justification for keeping Nixon on the 1952 ticket is relevant: “I’d rather have him inside the tent pissing out than outside pissing in”.
Maybe Santos needs to get a dog?
On the other hand, for McCarthy and House GOP leadership to push for Santos’s removal would help to trigger a special election (assuming it happens prior to next year), with probably a good chance of that seat flipping back to the Democrats. And that, too, would be a bad look.
So McCarthy really does have power?
Precedent is that they only get expelled for unambiguous treason or after being convicted of a a felony.
I think that if he’s extradited to Brazil, that would be a novel but plausible reason to expel — then he cannot do the job. But expelling members for crimes they may conceivably be acquitted of seems to me a bad idea.
I’m kind of surprised that it isn’t. I suffered under two supervisors who were pathological liars (hey, I worked in advertising…), and both told so many lies that were easily checked and resulted in termination.
What floored me was that almost none of the lies were necessary: none resulted in an advantage, either professionally or financially.
As I watched Georgie’s lies come to light, then another batch, then another… I recalled those liars and once again asked “WHY would a person DO that?” If it isn’t recognized as a DSM-5 disorder, it sure presents as one.
Really the only power McCarthy has to punish Santos unilaterally is to leave him committee-less, approve him not one staff position or one cent more in the office account than the mandatory minimum, put any purchasing or service request from his office at the bottom of the pile
For anything else he needs votes. He can signal to the Ethics Committee whether to hurry up or slow walk any complaints but that still relies on the committee responding to that.
Nobody disputes that Santos indeed misrepresented the holy hell out of everything in his candidacy, and nothing but “we haven’t done this before” prevents a political decision being reached within the House to the effect that “hey, this is not a court-of-law criminal trial, it’s political body subject to the standard for impeachments, we DON’T HAVE to wait for an external conviction.”
However, though the Constitution makes each house the sole judge of a member continuing to remain qualified to serve, and of disciplinary punishments, the wording is agreed to mean that expulsion cannot be “at will” but for cause. In modern times that would come after a referral to the Ethics Committee resulting in a report recommending this specific disciplinary action. And then you’d still need the votes.
If the House situation is too delicate to spare one member, what may happen is the investigation is dragged on so they can hold on to that seat as long as they can, and even then they would still requite 290 votes i.e. at least 78 Republicans willing and able to do it.
In a New York special election, party leaders select the nominee.
This seems to me a significant advantage to the Republicans, because the risk of GOP primary voters picking a weak/extreme nominee is virtually eliminated. It doesn’t guarantee a GOP victory, but I think it makes it probable.
But would they be willing to take the risk at all? I mean, as I mentioned elsewhere they’d need whoever’s the most (real and verifiable) star-spangled All-American Boy/Girl Scout superstar Republican in the whole of Long Island to run for the seat and even then it would be a gamble. They may think “better the devil you know…”
There are risks all around.
What about the risk of a flaming Trumper winning the 2024 primary? If they can get a normal Republican to win this year, that risk is will go way down.
The Nassau GOP leader must have had a strong new candidate in mind when today calling for Santos to resign.
The State of New York has 10 days after he is gone to organize a special election to replace Santos. I’m pretty sure a Democrat would win after this embarrassing debacle.
I think once Mr. Santos is indicted by any one of the several agencies pursuing charges, McCarthy may have to get rid of him.
He may as well. Santos won’t be able to proxy-vote from jail, according to the new House rules.
What does the State of Virginia have to do with this?
LOL, sorry. Nothing at all. I misspoke – State of New York. I’ve got Virginia on my mind because of their special election today.
ETA: Changed in my original post.
I suspect that if all he’s done is lie, nothing will happen. But his finances stink to high heaven, and it looks like really incompetent fraud and embezzlement. I don’t think they’re going to have a choice, except how long they keep this stinker on their boat.