George Santos Sentenced to 87 Months in Prison

Former Rep. George Santos (R-NY) was sentenced to 87 months in prison after he was convicted of wire fraud and aggravated identify theft.

Santos made headlines during his short but turbulent tenure in Congress as a serial fabulist and outspoken supporter of President Donald Trump, but soon found it difficult to find allies even among his fellow Republicans after his lies and schemes came to light. He was expelled from Congress in December 2023 after being criminally indicted on 13 federal charges, the House Ethics Committee released a damning report chronicling his transgressions, and one of his fellow Republican congressmen accused Santos of defrauding him – and even his mother.

Santos attempted a political comeback by announcing he was running for a different Congressional seat in March 2024 — a few hours after he was unceremoniously booted from his seat at the State of the Union address — but ended up pleading guilty to two counts in August 2024.

In that plea, Santos admitted to using his congressional campaign fundraising for personal gain, submitting false campaign finance reports

to the FEC, and committing identity theft by stealing the personal and financial information of campaign donors who were elderly or cognitively impaired, making fraudulent charges on their credit cards. Santos also admitted to soliciting donations to what he claimed was a super PAC or social welfare charity, but instead using the funds collected to pay for stays at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas, pay off his credit card debts, gift himself thousands of dollars in cash, and purchase luxury items from Hermès, Louis Vuitton, and Brooks Brothers.

The news about Santos’ sentence was reported Politico legal reporter Erica Orden, who attended the sentencing hearing in Central Islip, New York on Friday.

The former congressman will be required to report to prison on July 25 to begin serving his sentence, which will also include having to pay more than $373K in restitution and two years of supervised release after his prison term.

According to CNN, Santos was “sobbing” in the courtroom as he delivered a brief statement to the judge, admitting that he had “betrayed the confidence entrusted in me.”

“I cannot rewrite the past, but I can control the road ahead, I have tried my best,” Santos added.

Santos’ pleas failed to sway U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert with the Eastern District of New York, who denounced him as “an arrogant fraudster talking out of both sides of his mouth” to commit “flagrant thievery” as she announced

the more than seven-year sentence.

As Politico senior legal affairs reporter Kyle Cheney noted, this was the sentence that the Department of Justice had sought. Santos had asked the court for a two-year sentence.

This is a breaking news story and has been updated.