The US House of Representatives has voted in a historic move to expel scandal-plagued Congressman George Santos for corruption.
The vote was issued on Friday after it emerged that Santos had lied in his professional biography, from his education and religion to his personal history and professional experience.
Santos, who represents the country’s Republican Party, is also charged for stealing donor cash to fund his lavish lifestyle.
Credit card fraud, money laundering and identity theft are also on the list.
Santos has denied his criminal charges, while accusing the Ethics Committee of a “smear campaign.”
“My future former colleague is divorced from reality. He has manufactured his entire life,” said Marc Molinaro, a fellow New York Republican.
“He is a perpetrator of a massive fraud on his constituents and the American people,” Pennsylvania Rep. Susan Wild, the top Democrat on the Ethics Committee, said Thursday.
Florida’s Matt Gaetz defended Santos in a floor speech on Thursday, saying, “Since the beginning of Congress, there’s only two ways you get expelled: You get convicted of a crime, or you participated in the Civil War. Neither apply to George Santos.”
The decision comes after a congressional ethic investigation that found “overwhelming evidence” of misconduct and accused him of seeking to “fraudulently exploit every aspect of his House candidacy.”
The scandal-plagued New Yorker was ousted in an overwhelming vote supported by more than 100 of his fellow Republicans.
He is the sixth House member to be expelled since 1786 and the first since 2002, When Ohio Democrat James Traficant was ousted over a bribery conviction.
His criminal trial is set to go to trial next September.
