Scandal in the Wind 2023. George Santos gets Sashayed

[The Mikado]

Prediction: He serves out the whole two year term but doesn't run for reelection. I think that's the sweet spot here: the jig is up and with this much open ammo and 2024, a Presidential election year with Presidential election-level turnout AND giant gaping scandals, he'd be cooked and knows it. He does his two years and gets to be "Former Congressman Santos (if that is his real name)" for the rest of his life. Not a bad prize for a con artist.

[The Mikado]

Does someone have NY-03's numbers in Hochul-Zeldin?

[The Mikado]

Does someone have NY-03's numbers in Hochul-Zeldin?

I'd love to see their #s in all of the competitive districts tbh

Ben Rosenblatt on Twitter. More or less matched Zeldin.

Also that doesn't appear to be a real Churchill Quote. One some level I wouldn't be surprised if this is a pathological liar.

A Biden +8, Zeldin +14 seat. Woof. Dems really fell through the floor in Long Island.

EDIT: Apparently this is only the Nassau County part of the seat. The district does contain a small bit of Queens so it probably isn't QUITE this bad.

[The Mikado]

...in what possible universe was 'Devolder' ever a plausible name for a supposedly Ukrainian Jewish family? That ought to have been flagged up immediately.

Google says that Devolder is Dutch/Flemish in origin.

His mother's first name was Fatima, which is Arabic. I'm not aware of Jewish Fatimas though I suppose its possible given some inter-religion commonality between middle eastern names. But her parents were the very Christian sounding names Paul and Rosalina.

Many Fatimas in the West are Spanish/Portuguese. The name held on in Iberia long after the Muslims left.

[The Mikado]

George Santos, 2028 GOP Presidential nominee.

[The Mikado]

Tulsi Gabbard just bodied Santos while guest hosting Tucker tonight.

Imagine that. Santos was too far even for a transparently self-serving grifter like Tulsi.

If the institutional right-leaning media (Fox/NY Post/basically anything owned by NewsCorp) are doing this it seems like a pretty transparent sign that the Republican powers-that-be want him gone. My guess is they know where his money came from and can foresee the fallout. Don't be surprised if things move quickly almost immediately after he votes to make McCarthy speaker.

IMO it's basically the opposite. Tulsi is Tucker's guest host and Tucker is a staunch anti-Kevin McCarthy person. It seems to me much more like Tulsi and Tucker's game is to try to force Santos out to make McCarthy's math harder and increase the likelihood that someone else becomes Speaker. That what this is really about is Dumping Kevin McCarthy and Santos is just a way to that end.

[The Mikado]

Honestly, at this point, if he doesn't resign, Dems get to have a nice comedic punching bag for the next two years. Probably fine either way. Incredibly easy vector of attack on the House Majority. Make him the symbol of the House GOP. Spread this story and do "Congressman X votes with George Santos 98% of the time...what does he have to hide?"

[The Mikado]

https://mobile.twitter.com/thedailybeast/status/1608223823270141952

I'm mildly surprised Donnelly's bothering. I guess this shows Santos really pissed off the Nassau County Republican Party, otherwise they'd be protecting him.

Several people on Discord suggested Donnelly just wants Santos' job and is trying to chase him out to get at it?

[The Mikado]

https://mobile.twitter.com/MuellerSheWrote/status/1608221329291108354

Not if Kevin McCarthy abolishes proxy voting like he wants to!

[The Mikado]

:siren: MAJOR DEVELOPMENT :siren:


https://twitter.com/mexmtnmama/status/1279269091606478849

https://twitter.com/Santos4Congress/status/1280180135510056960

GEORGE SANTOS IS BLACK. REPEAT: GEORGE SANTOS IS BLACK. This is not a drill.

[The Mikado]

So does the Congressional Black Caucus let George Santos join?

[The Mikado]

I owe an apology to George Santos and his black dad:




https://twitter.com/RobertMackey/status/1608336258203541505

George Santos: actually half black. My bad.

[The Mikado]

Devolder Santos??

https://twitter.com/Santos4Congress/status/1176543389468254208

You're misinterpreting.

He ran for Congress in 2020 as George Devolder-Santos and ran for Congress in 2022 as George Santos. Devolder wasn't his first name.

[The Mikado]

Personally, I consider Hispanic and Latino synonyms and Brazilians to count as Latinos because Portugal, like Spain, shares in Iberian Latin-derived culture and was part of Roman Hispania.
Brazilians may identify as Lusophone, but Lusophone is not a common term in America and there's enough common ground for them to count as Latino, given they are routinely classified as being part of Latin America.
This has to be one of the few areas I cut Santos any slack, given the man is a serial liar.

[The Mikado]

Santos will likely be the last person to realize that Santos is done.

What does "done" mean here? I think George Santos is already aware he's a one and done Congressman and won't even bother running again in 2024, but if he doesn't want to resign the GOP can't easily push him out. McCarthy's certainly not gonna hold an expulsion vote basically no matter how bad the story gets. He can't shrink his majority safely.

[The Mikado]

I could maybe buy 2024 presidential looking like 2022 Senate in NY, but not 2022 Gov. People are more willing to break for state offices than federal offices.

Now granted, Schumer lost Nassau County by 3 in 2022, but he didn't lose it by 11 like Hochul did.

[The Mikado]

Because Santos' name is a big controversy tonight, a refresher on what we THINK we know:

A. His name is George Anthony Devolder Santos. Therefore his name is actually George Santos.

B. HOWEVER, he spent most of the 2010s going by Anthony Devolder. These are both his names, but he was using his middle names as an alias.

C. Therefore, it's not "George Santos is an alias for Anthony Devolder," it's both of those are his name but for some unknown reason he wanted to use a different name than the one he'd been presenting with publicly when he ran for office. Presumably there's a lot of stuff under the Anthony Devolder name he thought he could get away from by using a different name, but he was as far as we can tell still born as George Santos.

Our understanding can change yet again, but for now, George Santos = Anthony Devolder, but neither is quite a true "fake name." He just switched between one identity and the other when he went into public life to throw off google etc.

[The Mikado]

If he indeed resigns, I guess Hochul would be interested in calling a special election very fast? Democrats should play it save then and nominate Suozzi. Not my favorite guy, but the safest bet for a pickup and make a small Republican majority even thinner.

Looked up NY special elections and from what I'm gathering, Hochul has a relatively narrow window. She has to call the special election for "not less than 70 nor more than 80 days" from when the vacancy occured, so roughly two and a half months.