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Vittert: Will stealing from dying dog bring down Santos?

Rep.-elect George Santos (R-N.Y.) is seen during the thirteenth ballot for Speaker on Friday, January 6, 2023.

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(NewsNation) — You can now add stealing from a dog with cancer to the list of Congressman George Santos’ misdeeds. If the response online says anything, the case of Sapphire the support dog might finally bring him down.

The story broke overnight, a new lie from Santos, which would say something because the newly elected congressman from Long Island lied about almost everything.

We’ve, in fact, gone through the lengthy list. He said he attended a prestigious prep school. He didn’t. But he graduated from NYU and Baruch College? He didn’t do that, either.

Maybe he could redeem himself by starting and running a charity called Friends of Pets United. We’re going to get back to that in a minute. It depends on what you define as a charity and what you mean by “ran.”

Let’s continue with his resume. Even if the charity is fake, don’t worry, he worked at Goldman Sachs and Citigroup, yes? Nope. He lost employees in the Pulse nightclub shooting? Totally false.

Santos said his Jewish family escaped the Holocaust. His family is neither Jewish nor did they escape the Holocaust. But he owned substantial real estate so he must be a good businessman. Except that he doesn’t.

His mother died in 9/11? Nope. His mother died because of 9/11? Not true, either.

Yet, he is a member of Congress, duly elected as a Republican in a competitive New York District.

Sure, he joins 535 other members of Congress, many of whom have a loose association, of course with the truth when it comes to their resumes. Senators Warren and Blumenthal come to mind. But really, to be fair, they are rank amateurs compared to the Hall of Fame lies told by George Santos.

So reporters now follow Santos around the Capitol every day asking if he will resign. And as you heard, he continues to tell them no, he won’t. So they asked every Republican they can find if they will vote to expel Santos from the House. Constitutionally, they can, but so far, nothing has risen to the level of expulsion in the eyes of Kevin McCarthy.

All the lies Santos told are just not enough for McCarthy because McCarthy needs Santos. He’s a reliable vote for the now speaker. With only a handful of votes in the majority, McCarthy needs Santos, or should we say, he needs “Anthony Devolder.”

“Devolder” is one of Santos’ aliases. That name matches the charity we mentioned earlier: Friends of Pets United. That’s the name he allegedly used when talking with a veteran about saving his dog, Sapphire.

Richard Osthoff visited a vet with his support dog a few years ago. Sapphire the dog helped him with his PTSD. The dog had cancer and surgery cost $3,000. Don’t worry, said a vet tech to this distraught and broke veteran. He knew a charity that would help.

Friends of Pets United was run by Anthony Devolder, aka George Santos. Devolder or Santos, whatever you want to call him, started a GoFundMe page with pictures of Sapphire and Osthoff’s story. They raised $3,000 to save Sapphire.

Then Santos allegedly ran off with the money. There are text messages, of course, about this. And then Santos just disappears on the veteran. The veteran says Santos stop responding to everything. Sapphire died a couple of months later.

I say all of this because there would certainly be a justice, a certain kind of justice, if Sapphire of all things, finally brought down Santos.

It’s a lesson, of course, Hollywood learned a long time ago: Never kill the dog. Seriously, when was the last time you saw a movie where the dog dies? It’s beyond the pale. It’s something that we as humans just don’t talk about, think about or want to deal with, except for Santos. So, now we’ll see if Congress learns the same lesson.

The views expressed in this article are those of the author, and not of NewsNation.

On Balance with Leland Vittert

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