Life as a fictional character
Noah Lanard and David Corn find that fact-chaecking the freshman congressman from New York is more like editing a work of fiction:
In September 2020, George Santos’ congressional campaign reported that Victoria and Jonathan Regor had each contributed $2,800—the maximum amount—to his first bid for a House seat. Their listed address was 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson Township, New Jersey.
A search of various databases reveals no one in the United States named Victoria or Jonathan Regor. Moreover, there is nobody by any name living at 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson. That address doesn’t exist. There is a New Mexico Street in Jackson, but the numbers end in the 20s, according to Google Maps and a resident of the street.
Santos’ 2020 campaign finance reports also list a donor named Stephen Berger as a $2,500 donor and said he was a retiree who lived on Brandt Road in Brawley, California. But a spokesperson for William Brandt, a prominent rancher and Republican donor, tells Mother Jones that Brandt has lived at that address for at least 20 years and “neither he or his wife (the only other occupant [at the Brandt Road home]) have made any donations to George Santos. He does not know Stephen Berger nor has Stephen Berger ever lived at…Brandt Road.”
Federal law makes it illegal to donate to a federal political campaign under a false name. But then, we don’t even know what the congressman’s real name is.
Lawrence O’Donnell the other night noted that Santos (if that is his name) did not show up at a White House event for new members of Congress to which he was invited. Perhaps, O’Donnell speculated, because one must furnish the Secret Service with a birthdate and Social Security number so they can run a background check before letting you onto the White House grounds [timestamp 1:57]. The Secret Service is particular that way.
What Mother Jones found was that many Santos 2020 donors are not real people.
These questionable donations, which account for more than $30,000 of the $338,000 the Santos campaign raised from individual donors in 2020, have not been previously cited in media reports. Mother Jones identified them by contacting (or trying to contact) dozens of the most generous donors to Santos’ 2020 campaign, which he ended up losing by 12 points.
Santos did not respond to a detailed list of questions Mother Jones sent to his lawyer and his congressional office that included names of donors whose identities could not be verified.
The donations are the latest in the Long Island fabulists’ seemingly endless series of political mysteries. Santos has already been caught lying about various elements of his biography including the schools he attended, his religion, his previous employment, his family history, his mother’s death, and having been a volleyball star. He also has yet to explain how he acquired the more than $700,000 he loaned his most recent congressional campaign.
Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera, as the fictionalized king of Siam might say.
During Santos’ first run for Congress, only about 45 people maxed out to his campaign during the primary and general elections. In nine instances, Mother Jones found no way to contact the donor because no person by that name now lives at the address listed on the reports the Santos campaign filed with the FEC. None had ever contributed to a candidate before sending Santos the maximum amount allowed, according to FEC records. Nor have any of these donors contributed since. The Santos campaign’s filings list the profession of each of these donors as “retired.”
I did oppo research on our opponent’s donors as a volunteer on my first congressional race. Many obscured their employment by listing their occupation as “executive.” A little Google sleuthing would turn up an oil industry magnate here or a coal baron there.
The task is harder when the donors and addresses are fictional, as Mother Jones found.
These donations suggest a troubling pattern. In campaign filings, names and addresses of contributors are occasionally wrongly recorded. Campaigns do have an obligation to file accurate reports, and they often make efforts to confirm information for major donors, people with whom they want to maintain contact. It is unusual to find a significant number of high-level donors on a campaign filing who cannot be identified or located. The existence of such donations raises questions about the source of these contributions. Talking Points Memo has also reported a case of a Santos donor being charged for contributions he or she did not approve.
Mother Jones adds that several top Santos donors it contacted confirmed that they did make the reported donations. But even one of those had questions remaining.
Santos is already a punchline. It’s only a matter of time before someone turns his life into musical theater.