Rep. George Santos' election victory last year flipped a seat in New York formerly held by a Democrat, helping Republicans secure a narrow majority in the House. But it soon became clear that many of his campaign claims were lies.
He called himself "a proud American Jew," the grandson of Ukrainian Holocaust survivors.
"I'm very proud of my grandparents' story: My grandfather fleeing Ukraine, fleeing Stalin's persecution, going to Belgium, finding refuge there, marrying my grandmother, then fleeing Hitler, going to Brazil. That's a story of perseverance," he said.
But genealogical research found no Jewish ancestry in Santos' family.
He said he was a seasoned Wall Street investor, working for Goldman Sachs and Citigroup. But The New York Times reports neither firm has records of Santos ever working for them.
He claimed he attended a prestigious prep school in the Bronx then graduated from Baruch College. There are no records of Santos attending either school.
Friends of Pets United is an animal rescue group Santos said he founded as a tax-exempt organization. The IRS has no records of a registered charity by that name. His fundraiser for a military veteran's dog is under investigation.
Santos also claimed he earned $750,000 and between $1 million to $5 million in dividends from his own company, The Devolder Organization, in 2021. Santos said he arranged transactions between wealthy people. It's unclear what Devolder actually does.
As the discrepancies piled up, Santos explained some of his lies in a February interview with Piers Morgan.
"I've been a terrible liar on those subjects," Santos said. "What I tried to convey to the American people is I made mistakes of allowing the pressures of what I thought and needed to be done in order to ... This wasn't about tricking anybody, this wasn't about.."
"Yes it was," Morgan responded. "The whole thing was about tricking people."
"Let me finish," Santos said. "It wasn't about tricking the people. This was about getting accepted by the party."
The calls for Santos to resign began less than a week after he took office.
He has consistently rejected all of them.
Rep. George Santos pleads not guilty to charges of fraud, theft
Rep. George Santos was released from custody on a $500,000 bond.
