End Citizens United (ECU) is calling for a new investigation into Congressman George Santos and his campaign staff in a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
Click here to read coverage of the complaint in USA Today.
“Fraudulently impersonating the Republican Minority Leader’s staff to solicit campaign contributions is a gross violation of federal law. George Santos and his campaign staff knew exactly what they were doing, and they successfully swindled donors out of hundreds of thousands of dollars,” said End Citizens United President Tiffany Muller. “The FEC should immediately open an investigation and hold Santos accountable.”
Muller added, “Kevin McCarthy may have been the victim of fraud, but he deserves a lot of credit for allowing Santos’ fraud to persist. He was aware of this scheme as early as August 2021 and helped keep it quiet. Now that the matter is public and before the FEC, McCarthy should answer whether he believes Santos should be punished for breaking the law.”
The complaint states Sam Miele, who worked as a fundraiser for George Santos’ congressional campaign during the 2020 and 2022 election cycles, impersonated Dan Meyer, the chief of staff to then Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, to solicit campaign contributions to Santos’ campaign. Federal law states that no person shall fraudulently misrepresent themselves as acting on behalf of a candidate or an agent of a candidate for the purpose of soliciting contributions.
The complaint:
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Reports emerged that a member of Congressman Santos’ political team sent calls and emails to wealthy donors “from a man who said he was Dan Meyer, McCarthy’s chief of staff, during the 2020 and 2022 election cycles.”
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According to several sources, Miele called donors pretending to be Meyer and sent follow-up emails from a fake address. One fundraiser said that they were suspicious following one of Miele’s solicitations and used their contacts “to get in touch with the chief of staff and he said, ‘This isn’t me.’”
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Reports indicate that McCarthy’s team learned of the Congressman’s campaign’s behavior as early as August 2021.
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In response to press inquiries, Elliot Berke, counsel to Kevin McCarthy for Congress, said: “When this issue came to our attention last year, I raised it with the Santos campaign and felt it was resolved to our satisfaction.”
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Majority Leader McCarthy himself responded, saying: “It happened and I know they corrected [it], but I was not notified about that until a later day.”
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Federal law states that “no person shall fraudulently misrepresent themselves as speaking, writing, or otherwise acting for, or on behalf of, any candidate or agent thereof for the purpose of soliciting contributions or donations” or “willfully and knowingly participat[ing] in or conspir[ing] to participate in any plan, scheme, or design to” misrepresent a candidate for the purpose of soliciting donations.”
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In clear violation of this rule, it appears that Miele, acting on behalf of Santos’ campaign, misrepresented that he was acting on behalf of McCarthy and his campaign employee and official side chief of staff, Dan Meyer, in order to solicit donations to Santos’ campaign.
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The reporting suggests Miele engaged in this activity to give the impression that McCarthy supported or endorsed the solicitations.
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Further, this activity did not occur in isolation; rather, it appears that Miele engaged in these fraudulent fundraising activities over the course of two election cycles.
Click here to read the complaint.
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