The Daily Santos: Vol. 8
Plus some news about The Handbasket!
A quick note before we dive in…
The Handbasket is switching to a subscription model! I started this newsletter last year to maintain an independent media presence outside of the outlets that publish my work, and to make sure I always had a place to share my unfiltered voice. With the overnight popularity of The Daily Santos feature, I realized, hey, maybe this is something worth paying for! Posts will remain free until next week, at which point they’ll mostly be paywalled. You can pay $8 monthly or $80 for the year. I hope you’ll consider supporting my work!
OK, back to George.
The big story yesterday was obviously the photo that surfaced of Santos dressed in drag as a younger man in Brazil. Since I shared my interview with Eula Rochard, the Brazilian drag queen who originally posted the photo, it’s been a wild ride. And it all culminated with Santos himself addressing the story in a tweet Thursday morning.
Despite the fact that ABC News confirmed my reporting and there’s literally photo and video evidence, George is in full denial mode, as per usual. He also denied the story I shared Tuesday about stealing money from the GoFundMe for a disabled veteran’s service dog’s tumor surgery, which is really quite a sentence. But perhaps the funniest part about his response to this empirically awful barrage of press is that he doesn’t seem that bothered. He’s rolling with the punches, even when the punches are nonstop.
Justice for Sapphire
The Queens District Attorney’s office confirmed to Law & Crime News that their office is looking into Santos’ handling of the case of veteran Richard Osthoff and his dearly departed pup, Sapphire. A spokesperson said: “While as a matter of course we don’t comment on open investigations, we are reviewing whether Queens County has jurisdiction over any potential criminal offenses.”
Santos was already under scrutiny by that same office, with DA Melinda Katz indicating in December that her office was looking into his sworn statement that he’d been mugged, despite no police record of it.
As I said on All In with Chris Hayes last night, you can mess with people all you want, but the moment pets are involved, you’ve crossed the rubicon.
Even the fiercest Republicans are turning
Conservative newspaper the Washington Times has had about ENOUGH from George. In a snippy little op-ed on Thursday, writer Joseph Curl shot it straight:
If you’re a conservative, forget that he’s a Republican. He‘s a liar, and he should be drummed out of Congress posthaste.
But not to Mr. McCarthy, who is sitting on a tiny majority, just 222-213. He needs bodies. Asked about Mr. Santos admitting to fabricating much of his resume, Mr. McCarthy told reporters, “So did a lot of people here in the Senate and others.”
So there you have it. The new speaker alleges that “a lot” of people on Capitol Hill have inflated their resumes to get their jobs. Mr. McCarthy has refused to call for Mr. Santos to resign, but he also says Mr. Santos will have to face the music eventually.
Go off, Joe! While it’s cathartic to see that even Republicans have their limits, it’s incredible that an international conman of mystery is the thing that’s finally getting them to burst. Even poor Laverne is in shambles.
And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention another op-ed in yesterday’s New York Times by the one, the only former New York Congressman Peter King. Pete, as the real ones call him, held his office for nearly 30 years until retiring in 2020, and before redistricting, represented parts of the area where George now reigns supreme.
In his missive, King writes about the most important tools for being an effective congressman (besides boatloads of lobbyist money): “Meaningful achievement begins with some measure of cooperation with colleagues based on friendship, ideology, party affiliation, shared interests, previous collaboration or some combinations thereof. And almost always, mutual trust is a bedrock part of those relationships.”
Now obviously our friend George is a bit behind the 8-ball here, but King thinks it’s simply too late for our favorite fraudster to make things right. He sticks the landing by saying, “For at least this one moment in his life, it is time for Mr. Santos to face reality, do the honorable thing and resign the seat in Congress.”
Quite the fighting words from a guy who said of former President Trump in May 2020 “I think he’s done an excellent job.”
And finally…
I’ll let Leslie Jones have the last word today. “You’re gonna mess with someone’s dog? Have you not heard of John Wick?”
Have a Santos-related tip? Email MKwrites4000@proton.me
Up until January and "The Daily Santos" (which is wonderful to read), you were writing about one article a month I think? As you switch to paid content, can you speak to your plans for what we can expect going forward? Do you think you'll have a mix of paid and free content, and do you have a sense of how much content you might be writing?
Please don't go to a pay wall. People can't afford it and this stuff needs as wide an audience as possible. Monetising it is the wrong move on many levels.