House of Representatives
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Embattled congressman George Santos has broken his silence to insist he will not resign over growing calls to step down over his growing history of lying about his past.
On Wednesday afternoon (Jan. 11), as the freshman Republican congressman was leaving his office, he was asked about the calls to resign from local officials of his party by ABC reporter Rachel Scott. “Will you step down?”, she asked. Santos swiftly answered, “I will not.” As he stepped onto the elevator, he refused to answer further questions from other reporters.
Santos would later take a more defiant tone on social media. “I was elected to serve the people of #NY03, not the party & politicians, I remain committed to doing that and regret to hear that local officials refuse to work with my office to deliver results to keep our community safe and lower the cost of living. I will NOT resign!”, he wrote.
Earlier on, leaders from the Nassau County Republican Party had held a press conference to publicly call on Santos to resign. “Today, on behalf of the Nassau County Republican Committee, I’m calling for his immediate resignation,” committee chairman Joseph G. Cairo said to the press. Saying he “deceived voters”, Cairo continued: “His lies were not mere fibs. He disgraced the House of Representatives. … He’s not welcome here at Republican headquarters.”
Cairo was joined by more than 20 prominent Republicans at the conference and remotely from Washington D.C., including four of Santos’ fellow members of the House – New York Representative Anthony D’Esposito along with Reps. Nick LaLota, Nick Langworthy, and Brandon Williams, as well as South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace. It was the strongest condemnation of the controversial politician from his own party to date, marking a sharp contrast to their full support of him during his campaigns in 2020 and 2022. Bruce Blakeman, Nassau County GOP executive, stated that Santos’ lies about being Jewish were particularly offensive. “He is a stain on the House of Representatives. He is a stain on the 3rd Congressional District,” he said.
The senior Republicans in the House – Speaker Kevin McCarthy, Majority Leader Steve Scalise, and Majority Whip Tom Emmer – have remained mum about the latest calls for Santos to resign. McCarthy said on Wednesday “the voters have a voice in the decisions, not where people pick and choose based upon what somebody’s press has.” The GOP currently has a slender majority in the House, thanks to Santos’ flipping of the district in the midterms.
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Controversial Republican politician George Santos has made headlines again, this time for flashing a white nationalist symbol during a vote in the House of Representatives last week.
Santos, the elected Republican representative from New York, was making his vote for Kevin McCarthy (R-Ca.) in the tenth round of his bid to become Speaker of the House of Representatives on Thursday (Jan. 5th). As he did by raising his right hand, his left arm was folded across his waist and observers noted from the coverage on C-SPAN that his left hand made a sideways “OK” gesture.
The gesture has been appropriated by white nationalists as an expression of white supremacy, which was first boosted by right-wing trolls on the 4chan website in jest. There are those who use the gesture as a way to “trigger liberals,” as shown by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Santos’ action was not received well by many, including another Representative from New York, Democrat Ritchie Torres who derisively wrote on Twitter: “George Santos is not biracial but tri-racial. He has Latino, black, and now white power.”
Santos has been constantly under fire ever since he admitted to lying about large swaths of his work and education history after an investigation by the New York Times in late December found many discrepancies in his story. Further investigations also found that Santos had attended a gala in Manhattan that was frequented by numerous white nationalist figures and prominent supporters of former President Donald Trump.
Santos was sworn in after McCarthy finally was elected speaker on Friday night (Jan. 6th). The troubles for the congressman aren’t over – on Monday morning (Jan. 9th), a formal ethics complaint was filed against him with the Federal Election Commission by the Campaign Legal Center. The Washington D.C.-based nonprofit group contends that Santos illegally used campaign funds for personal use. Authorities in Brazil have also announced that they will reopen a fraud case against Santos involving a stolen checkbook in 2008 in Rio de Janeiro.
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Rep. Hakeem Jeffries decided that his first order of business as the new House Minority Leader was to address the division in the House of Representatives between the Republicans and Democrats. The congressman then launched into a speech employing the alphabet that took some slight digs at Republicans and urged collaboration.
Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, 52, graciously extended his party’s hand to the newly-elected House Speaker, Rep. Kevin McCarthy, and members of his party vowing to find “common ground” in their future proceedings.
“We do extend our hand of partnership to you and want to make clear that we extend and intend to try to find common ground whenever and wherever possible on behalf of the American people,” Jeffries said. “Not as Democrats, not as Republicans, not as independents, but as Americans. But I also want to make clear that we will never compromise our principles.”
Jefferies then launched into his “Alphabetical Slaughter” (Look up this classic from Papoose) speech, using each letter of the alphabet to deliver a poignant line.
The speech in full below:
House Democrats will always put American values over autocracy, benevolence over bigotry, the Constitution over the cult, democracy over demagogues, economic opportunity over extremism, freedom over fascism, governing over gaslighting, hopefulness over hatred, inclusion over isolation, justice over judicial overreach, knowledge over kangaroo courts, liberty over limitation, maturity over Mar-a-Lago, normalcy over negativity, opportunity over obstruction, people over politics, quality of life issues over QAnon, reason over racism, substance over slander, triumph over tyranny, understanding over ugliness, voting rights over voter suppression, working families over the well-connected, xenial over xenophobia, “Yes we can” over “You can do it,” and zealous representation over zero-sum confrontation.
We will always do the right thing by the American people, so let us not grow weary of doing good for the American people who will reap the benefit of the harvest if we do not give up. God bless you, God Bless the house, and God bless the United States of America.
Salute to Rep. Hakeem Jeffries.
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Photo: Tom Williams / Getty
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In an astonishing display, Kevin McCarthy’s bid to become the Speaker of the House was thwarted three times – by members of his own Republican Party.
The House of Representatives convened Tuesday (Jan. 3) to open the 118th Congress, with Republicans having a slim majority after the midterm elections last November. As the first vote to elect the Speaker of the House unfolded, the congressman from California fell short as he received 203 votes with 19 voting for Jim Jordan, the GOP representative from Ohio. The second vote bore out the same results, and the third and final vote in the chamber actually saw McCarthy lose a vote, making the tally 202 to Jordan’s 20.
The failed bids marked the first time since 1923 that an election for speaker went through multiple ballots. In contrast, the Democrats in the House displayed a firm and unified stance as they nominated Rep. Hakeem Jeffries to be Speaker in each round of voting with no defections.
Many observers point to a giant divide between McCarthy, who was endorsed by former President Donald Trump to be in the role, and the 19 GOP members who represent the far-right segment of the party. This includes Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida and Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado. Boebert would later claim in a Fox News interview with Bret Baier that she and the other representatives had gone to McCarthy with a deal to help him attain the 218 votes needed for him to be Speaker but he “smugly refused.”
GOP members had also spent time Tuesday attempting to bargain with Democratic members of the House to not be present for the next round of votes so McCarthy could win. This was confirmed by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who was seen talking with both Gaetz and oddly enough, Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona. “McCarthy was suggesting he could get Dems to walk away to lower his threshold,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “And I fact-checked and said absolutely not.”
Meanwhile, Kevin McCarthy is refusing to cave in his attempt to obtain the speakership as the House will vote again at noon Wednesday (Jan. 4). “I’m staying until we win,” he said to members of the press between the second and third votes. “I know the path.” Trump put out a call for unity among Republicans in a Truth Social post on Wednesday morning, saying “it’s now time for all of our GREAT Republican House Members to VOTE FOR KEVIN.”
*UPDATE: After losing the 4th vote, It seems McCarthy is well on his way to losing a 5th, too.