Santos Filings Now Claim Net Worth of $11 Million
By Maureen Daly Controversial US congressional candidate George Santos has finally filed his Personal Financial Disclosure Report on September 6th - 20 months late - and he is claiming an inexplicable rise in his alleged net worth to $11 million.. Two years ago, in 2020, Santos' personal financial disclosures claimed that he had no assets over $5,000 - no bank accounts, no stock accounts, no real property. A net worth barely above "zero". And his income was only just over $50,000 for the prior year, derived from a venture fund called "Harbor Hill Capital," that was closed and seized in 2020 by US federal prosecutors as a "Ponzi Scheme." Santos was the New York Director of that "fund." Now, in a filing dated September 6th, 2022, Santos claims his assets are now as much as $11 million, including personal bank accounts of between $1 million and $5 million; a Condo in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, of between $500,000 and $1 million; and business interests of between $1 million and $5 million. Santos parents were from Brazil, according to Santos, and he has claimed to be a US-Brazilian dual citizen. Interestingly, Santos shows no US real property in his financial disclosure, although he has repeatedly claimed to own "a mansion in Oyster Bay Cove" on Tiffany Road; and "a mansion in the Hamptons" on Dune Road. He recently told several Republicans that he was selling his "Hamptons mansion" for $10 million, because he rarely uses it.
However an investigation of Santos' alleged "Hamptons mansion" showed the house is owned by someone else having nothing to do with Santos, and.has a market value of less than $2 million.
For a man of such alleged wealth, campaign records show that Santos and his husband live in a rented apartment, in an attached row house in Queens. (See photo)
Santos drives a Nissan, for which he took out a car loan of between $20,000 and $50,000, according to the disclosures.
Candidates for US Congress are required to file a full and truthful Financial Disclosure with the Clerk of the US House of Representatives, under the Ethics in Government Act. The trigger for filing is raising $5,000 in campaign funds, which deadline Santos passed 20 months ago, in January, 2021.
Santos claims to have "loaned" his campaign some $600,000.00 - which was reported in his US Federal Election Commission filings earlier in 2022. However the $600,000 "loan" does not show-up in his newly-filed 2022 personal financial disclosure.
Santos disclosures also state that he earned "nothing" - no income - over the past year.
It is a federal felony to make false filings in federal disclosures.
Under Brazilian Decree-Law No. 394 of April 28, 1938, and under Article V of the Constitution of Brazil, "no Brazilian national may be extradited" to any foreign country for crimes charged in that foreign country.
"Are we are being played as extras in 'The Talented Mr Santos' ?" asked one Republican leader.