California Democrat moves to force vote on expelling Santos after Ethics report

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.) moved to force a vote on expelling Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) on Tuesday, teeing up a third — and potentially historic — vote on the embattled lawmaker’s ouster.

Garcia, a top Santos critic, called his resolution to expel the New York Republican to the floor as a privileged measure Tuesday afternoon, a procedural gambit that forces the chamber to take action on the resolution within two legislative days. 

Santos has already survived two expulsion efforts this year — one in May and another in early November — but the current push has the greatest chance of being successful after a number of lawmakers initially skeptical of booting the embattled lawmaker said they will back his ouster in light of the House Ethics Committee’s scathing report on Santos. 

That landscape, however, lays out a sticky situation of sorts for Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who has to grapple with the political push-and-pull of whether to back Santos’s ouster. While Santos provides the slim House GOP majority with a key vote, the allegations against the GOP lawmaker have put a dark cloud around the party — especially vulnerable New York Republicans, who are facing pressure at home.

Johnson said Monday he had spoken with Santos “at some length” during the holiday recess “about his options.” Santos, who on numerous occasions has said he does not plan to resign, later wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that the conversation was “positive,” and noted that he told the Speaker that he would “be standing for the expulsion vote.”

Johnson and Santos spoke again Tuesday, Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.) told reporters. He said the Speaker told Santos that resignation “would be certainly an option that would prevent a lot of people from having to take some very tough votes.”

Santos later confirmed the conversation, telling reporters that Johnson asked “if I had made my decision,” to which Santos responded, “Yes; put up or shut up at this point.” 

“All these members are pushing this. They want me to resign because they don’t want to take this tough vote that sets the precedent to their own demise in the future, because they’re not immune from the, all the nonsense that goes on in Washington,” he said, later adding, “They can keep doing this, but my message to them is either put up or shut up, and enough of the charade.”

Santos also said Johnson “made a point to say that he was not calling me to asking me to resign.”

The looming vote — prompted by a damning Ethics Committee report released earlier this month — could put a bookend on Santos’s tumultuous tenure in Congress, which has been marked by federal indictments, votes on his ouster, and allegations that he told lies when running to represent New York’s 3rd Congressional District. 

And it could make him just the sixth sitting lawmaker to ever be booted from the House.

“Congress has done its investigation, has made its findings. The chair of the Ethics Committee — the Republican chair of the Ethics Committee — believes George Santos should be expelled, and it is time once and for all for George Santos to leave the halls of Congress,” Rep. Dan Goldman (D-N.Y.) told reporters Tuesday.

Goldman, who is co-leading the Santos expulsion resolution, sat next to Garcia on the House floor when he moved to force a vote on the legislation.

The bipartisan Ethics Committee released its long-awaited report shortly before the Thanksgiving recess, concluding that Santos “violated federal criminal laws.” The panel found Santos used campaign funds for trips to Atlantic City and Las Vegas, on Botox, at the luxury brand Hermés, and for purchases from OnlyFans, a subscription platform that is largely used for adult content.

Santos, for his part, has ferociously attacked the Ethics Committee and its body of work, slamming the final report as “biased” and a “disgusting political smear.” But he did predict that the latest expulsion effort would likely be successful, an acknowledgment that his days in Congress — after 11 months of serving — are numbered.

“I know I’m going to get expelled when this expulsion resolution goes to the floor,” Santos said during a conversation on X Spaces on Friday night. “I’ve done the math over and over, and it doesn’t look really good.”

The resolution from Garcia and Goldman, however, may not be the measure that brings an end to Santos’s time in Congress.

Rep. Michael Guest (R-Miss.), the chair of the Ethics Committee, introduced a resolution to expel Santos one day after his panel published its report, but has not yet called it to the floor as privileged, which would force a vote. The Mississippi Republican, however, told Politico that he also plans to trigger the procedural gambit.

Garcia and Goldman appeared open to backing Guest’s resolution if he does, indeed, move to force a vote on the measure, calling their move an “insurance policy.”

“This is an insurance policy to make sure that the Congress of the United States will vote as soon as possible to determine whether or not George Santos continues to belong in the Congress,” Goldman told reporters.

“If they also want to introduce another privileged resolution, that’s fine,” Garcia said. “The more the merrier.”

Despite the heightened political pressure, Santos is remaining defiant, brushing aside the looming vote and underscoring that he is in Washington to represent his constituents — for as long as that may be.

“This is the third time we’re going through this. I don’t care. I was sent here by the people of the 3rd District of New York, I represent them, not the political class in Washington, D.C.,” Santos said Tuesday. “If they want to send me home, if they think this was a fair process, if they think this is how it should be done and if they’re confident that this is a constitutional way of doing it, God bless their hearts.”

Emily Brooks contributed.

Updated at 5:43 p.m. ET