June 30 (UPI) — U.S. Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., made his first court appearance Friday as he faces a 13-count federal criminal indictment. His next court date was scheduled for Sept. 7.
Santos, free on $500,000 bond provided by his father and aunt, faces seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds and two counts of lying to the House of Representatives.
He pleaded not guilty to the charges in May.
At Friday’s court appearance prosecutors said they had delivered approximately 80,000 pages of documents to the defense lawyers.
Some constituents unhappy with Santos spoke out about a “firehose of garbage and deceit” as they called on Congress to eject him.
At a news conference, Jody Kass Finkel of Concerned Citizens of N.Y. 03 said, “We fully expect George Santos to go to prison, but that doesn’t solve our immediate problem.”
According to the Justice Department, Santos used campaign contributions for personal expenses and falsely collected over $24,000 in unemployment benefits, among other alleged crimes.
“Taken together, the allegations in the indictment charge Santos with relying on repeated dishonesty and deception to ascend to the halls of Congress and enrich himself,” U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said in a statement when the charges were announced in May. “He used political contributions to line his pockets, unlawfully applied for unemployment benefits that should have gone to New Yorkers who had lost their jobs due to the pandemic, and lied to the House of Representatives.”
Nassau County, N.Y., Republican leaders demanded Santos resign back in January.
“George Santos’ campaign last year was a campaign of deceit, lies and fabrication — he deceived the voters of the third congressional district, he deceived the members of the Nassau County Republican Committee, elected officials, his colleagues, candidates, his opponents and even some of the media,” Nassau County Republican Party Chairman Joseph Cairo said then during a press conference.