George Santos embraces limelight 3 months in, but questions linger about his life, possible reelection run
WASHINGTON — Three months after taking office, Rep. George Santos cannot evade what he and his staff call “the whispers.”
They're referring to the quiet chatter of people pointing out the embattled congressman as he walks through the halls of the U.S. Capitol — “Is that George Santos?”
Whispers may follow Santos (R-Nassau/Queens) as he confronts life in Congress as the subject of multiple investigations, but the first-term lawmaker is not quietly waiting them out as some Republican leaders had hoped.
He has rejected calls from protesters and Long Island Republican leaders to step down, and instead has seemingly embraced the limelight — trading verbal jabs with Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) at the State of the Union, appearing Tuesday outside Manhattan criminal court to support former President Donald Trump and signing onto controversial bills, including a proposal to make the AR-15 semiautomatic gun the “national gun.”
WHAT TO KNOW
- Three months after Rep. George Santos took office, questions linger about everything from his life story to where he lives.
- Santos continues to make high-profile public appearances, including at a rally outside Manhattan criminal court Tuesday to support Donald Trump.
- Santos won't say whether he'll seek reelection in 2024, but says he won't resign from his House seat.
Speaking to Newsday at his congressional office in Washington, Santos said he believed in the First Amendment rights of those calling for his resignation — but “I also believe in the presumption of ‘innocent until proven guilty.’”
Santos continued: “I look very much forward to the investigations wrapping up on the House side and to be able to come out of it on the other side and show people that speculation is not fact."
Santos, 34, arrived on Capitol Hill on Jan. 3 after defeating Democrat Robert Zimmerman in the November general election in the Third Congressional District, which includes parts of Nassau County and Queens.
It was Santos' second run for the office — he lost to then-Democratic Rep. Tom Suozzi, of Glen Cove, in 2020 — and while he was not well known when he ran in 2022, he benefited from stronger-than-usual turnout among GOP voters.
A crush of media surrounded him on his first day in Congress, weeks after a New York Times story detailed how he had misled voters about his education, work experience and family background.
Since then, the Nassau County District Attorney’s Office, the House Ethics Committee and U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York reportedly have launched investigations into the lawmaker.
The office of state Attorney General Letitia James also has said it was “looking into a number of issues" surrounding Santos.
As more information about Santos’ background has emerged, just as many questions seem to crop up.
Where does he live?
Unlike most members of Congress, Santos has not disclosed where he lives.
He told Newsday he lives in the Queens part of his district, but would not provide more details because of security concerns.
"I have chosen not to make my address public, not for transparency purposes, but more so for safety," Santos said. "Death threats are a common occurrence these days.”
House lawmakers are not required to live in the district they represent, only the state, but questions about Santos’ living arrangements persist.
In late December, Santos was photographed by the New York Post moving some belongings into his sister Tiffany Devolder’s apartment in Elmhurst, Queens.
A month later, she vacated the unit after having received an eviction notice nine months earlier for not paying rent, according to Queens County Civil Court records. Devolder settled with the landlord in February, agreeing to pay $19,500 in rent.
Santos told the New York Post in December he was living at the time in Huntington.
Status of investigations
Eliason told Newsday in an email, “it just takes a long time to subpoena, assemble and go through all the records and get all the relevant witnesses into the grand jury.”
Is Santos running for reelection?
What do we know about Santos' family story?
Santos has said he was born July 22, 1988 in Elmhurst Hospital in Queens.
Asked for confirmation of Santos' birth, a spokeswoman for New York City Health & Hospitals, which operates Elmhurst, told Newsday the agency “cannot disclose patient information."
Laura Figueroa Hernandez is the White House correspondent and previously covered New York City politics and government. She joined Newsday in 2012 after covering state and local politics for The Miami Herald.
