Bridge of Wills

Today’s expulsion vote results are in, and the lier is out. The truth of George Santos’ flagrant lies masqueraded as embellishments was that they weren’t merely outlandish lies- but outlandish lies that hid multiple accused violations of federal law, including using campaign funds for personal purposes and lying on financial disclosure statements filed with the house. Regardless of your political stripes, today’s vote for expulsion is a victory for truth and plain good governance in America, but despite this, the triumph contains an ugly truth.

Lies and Investigation

The catalog of lies for Santos seems unending, and an article should be devoted to them alone, picking from the buffet of comical lies the three-course meal includes:

• Lying about having Jewish ancestry involved in the Holocaust.
• Working with Goldman Sachs and Citigroup.
• His mother being in the 911 attacks.

The web of lies and half-truths launched a months-long Rules and Ethics Committee investigation that climaxed with this morning’s events- the results of the full investigation can be found here. Upon receiving the investigation results, the House GOP leadership reacted accordingly with prompt by pushing the vote back until after the yearly Thanksgiving recess and again pushing the vote back from the beginning of this week until today. The vote in the late morning was both resounding and disturbing.

The Vote

The results of the vote were 311 to 114, with Democrats voting along party line and Republicans split right down the middle. Before the vote, Santos expressed his obstinate defiance to his impending doom that began to look uncertain after the House GOP leadership said they would vote nay on the resolution. Santos, on his own accord, determined to blackmail his colleagues with allegations of drug use, corruption, and extramarital affairs. The scheming of this inept failed, and America scored a victory in a vote that should’ve been a unanimous and foregone conclusion. In the other six instances of expulsion in the chamber’s history, they were almost near unanimous affairs; the controversy of this vote is an ominous sign of the increasing partisanship of this country.

Danger

With the blatant evidence that Mr. Santos apparently violated the law multiple times, the House leadership and half of the Republican caucus voted against the resolution. The “nay” votes and conservative commentators have been quick to play “whataboutism” on the Democrats- the truth is that isn’t the point. Lying, fraud, and extortion should be condemned no matter who partakes in it: Democrat and Republican. Moral questions are not a party-line vote, and decency is not mutually exclusive to politics; the action that the House GOP leadership and half the caucus took against the resolution is an act of war on fundamental decency.

That one of the major parties, let alone the Republican Party, which is founded upon the basis those 112 Republicans chose to deny is a stain on both the history of the party and the history of the chamber. If we are quick to give up principle for convenience, selflessness for selfishness, compromise for party politics, and civility for indecency, our nation will indeed be lost.