The Movement: Trump’s Santos shocker divides Republicans

President Trump’s move to release expelled former Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) from prison might be the most divisive use of his clemency and pardon powers since he granted full pardons to Jan. 6 rioters.

Santos’s attorney Joseph Murray credited a number of MAGA movement stars in the House for helping him secure the grant of clemency: Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.), Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.), Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), and former Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.).

But there are plenty of Republicans, including those who led the charge to expel Santos from the House, who are not happy at his release — and that he will no longer have to replay those he defrauded. In 2023, 105 Republicans — a sizeable minority — voted to oust him.

Santos’s ex-colleagues in the House GOP from New York, many of whom were the biggest forces in expelling him from office ahead of his guilty plea and sentencing on fraud and embezzlement charges, are the most vocal in their discontent over the decision.

Rep. Nick LaLota (R-N.Y.) said on CNN that Santos is “distracting right now from President Trump’s awesome accomplishments on the border, on the economy.” Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-N.Y.) on CNN called the commutation “a wrong decision,” even if she thought the seven-year sentence was “harsh.” Rep. Andrew Garbarino (R-N.Y.), who sat on the House Ethics Committee that investigated Santos in record time, said in a statement to Politico that the commutation “is not justice.”

Discontent with Santos among Republicans extends far beyond New York. Rep. Max Miller (R-Ohio), for instance, alleged ahead of Santos’s expulsion that he had personally defrauded Miller and Miller’s mother by charging their credit cards without authorization, and that other GOP members “might have had the same experience.”

Trump’s commutation clears Santos from having to pay nearly $374,000 in restitution as part of his sentence. Santos said on CNN on Sunday that he would not pay any of that back if he is not required to by law.

“If I were the president, I might make a different decision,” House Freedom Caucus Chair Andy Harris (R-Md.) told me of Santos’s commutation.

But Harris didn’t seem particularly concerned about the move. “I have stopped thinking about George Santos a long time ago,” he added.

Whether more Republicans pipe up could depend on what Santos does next. One House Republican told me that “if he shuts the f— up,” Republicans will get over it. But if “he goes back to being his egomaniac self,” they won’t be happy.

Chances of Santos staying in the limelight and causing more headaches seem high. Before he went to prison, Santos said it would be his “life’s mission to out every fraud in Congress.”

Santos on Sunday, though, brushed off the criticism from Republicans, pointing to former President Biden pardoning his son Hunter Biden.

“So pardon me if I’m not paying too much attention to the pearl-clutching of the outrage of my critics and of the people predominantly on the left who are going to go out there and try to make a big deal out of something like this,” Santos said on CNN.

The Santos saga underscores the political reality for Republicans: When you’re loyal to Trump, he’ll let you do it.

Santos, who had written columns from prison for The North Shore Press documenting his struggles and time in lockup, had made “a passionate plea to President Trump” in the column published the Monday before his Friday commutation.

“A lifelong Republican and a proud believer in your America First vision, I never wavered. Supporting you wasn’t just a political decision — it was personal,” Santos wrote.

Santos wrote about being held in isolation due to alleged death threats, “locked inside a small steel cage twenty-four hours a day,” pleading: “You have always been a man of second chances, a leader who believes in redemption and renewal.”

Trump referenced Santos’s loyalty and prison conditions in his Truth Social message announcing Santos’s pardon: “Santos had the Courage, Conviction, and Intelligence to ALWAYS VOTE REPUBLICAN! George has been in solitary confinement for long stretches of time and, by all accounts, has been horribly mistreated.”

U.S. Pardon Attorney Ed Martin posted that Santos “had no greater friend” than Greene, who in August had sent a letter to the Department of Justice asking for Santos’s sentence to be commuted.

Boebert and Burchett this month had called for an investigation into the treatment of inmates at Santos’s prison.

It also probably helped Santos that he shares Trump’s knack for being an irresistibly entertaining character, making even his harshest critics laugh. It was only last week that I was remembering the bizarre time that Santos emerged from his office holding his staffers’ baby as former Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) was being yelled at by pro-Palestine protesters.

Santos went straight back to Cameo as soon as he got out of prison, where he made hundreds of thousands of dollars before reporting for his sentence.

Per fellow Capitol Hill reporter Juliegrace Brufke, he said in his first Cameo video out of the hammer: “Diva up, because there is no more diva down!”

Further reading: Social Media, Pleas From Allies and Prison Essays: How Santos Won His Freedom, by Michael Gold in The New York Times… CNN’s Dana Bash interviews Santos on “State of the Union”… Interview with FOX 5 New York…

Welcome to The Movement, a weekly newsletter looking at the influences and debates on the right in Washington. I’m Emily Brooks, House leadership reporter at The Hill.

Tell me what’s on your radar: ebrooks@thehill.com

Follow me on X: @emilybrooksnews

Not already on the list? Subscribe here

GROUP CHAT FALLOUT

As the dust settled on the racist Young Republican group chat over the weekend, MAGA-world and GOP staffers were still buzzing about how the texts were leaked in the first place — and whether the person behind the leak (rather than those behind the racist messages) should face any professional, or at least social, consequences.

But there’s still public feuding and ambiguity about who, exactly, gave the texts to Politico.

As reported in the original story, Small Business Administration staffer and group chat member Michael Bartels signed an affidavit claiming he did not give the log to Politico. He claimed that another Trump administration staffer in the State Department, Gavin Wax, obtained the chat log after threatening Bartels’ professional standing. Wax declined to comment to Politico.

There was apparent infighting between the statewide New York Young Republicans that Bartels was a part of and the New York City Young Republican Club.

The Daily Mail reported last week that senior White House officials confronted Wax about the alleged leak ahead of the group chat’s publication. The officials reportedly had a text conversation between Wax and the reporter working on the story showing that he provided contact information and background on the individuals mentioned in the chat. Some of those alleged conversations were posted on social media.

But other unnamed sources in the Daily Mail story said that Wax was being scapegoated and did not leak the texts.

And now some big media figures in the right-wing ecosystem are chiming in, too. Raheem Kassam, editor of The National Pulse and co-owner of MAGA haunt Butterworth’s, has also been publicly adamant that Wax did not leak the texts. Provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos is on the other side.

Keeping up with all that inter-personal drama of GOP staffers and operatives has me feeling like Gossip Girl.

The uproar over the cause of the leaks might also be shaking the GOP staffers and operatives because it is not an isolated incident. On Monday, Politico dropped a story about another group chat with Republicans that included racist messages from Paul Ingrassia, Trump’s nominee to lead the Office of Special Counsel.

ICYMI from me last week on the group chat reaction: To condemn or not to condemn? That is the question for Republicans after the group chat leak…

GUN RIGHTS CASE TO SCOTUS

This is your Second Amendment on drugs.

The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to take up a case that will assess whether a law that bans gun possession for drug users is constitutional.

My colleague Zach Schonfeld reports: “The Supreme Court will review a ruling favoring Ali Danial Hemani, an alleged regular marijuana user who was charged with the crime after agents searched his home and found cocaine, marijuana and a Glock 19. An appeals court dismissed the charge because prosecutors hadn’t alleged that Hemani was unlawfully under the influence when the gun was discovered, ruling such a broad scope wouldn’t comply with the Second Amendment.”

The DOJ’s defense of the law is peeving one gun rights group.

“Ali Danial Hemani, a suspected terrorist, misrepresents law-abiding gun owners who use marijuana legally. The DOJ’s defense of an unconstitutional law wastes the Supreme Court’s time when it could be addressing issues like ‘assault weapons’ bans or magazine capacity limits,” said Aidan Johnston, director of federal affairs at Gun Owners of America.

Meanwhile, National Association for Gun Rights spokesman Taylor D. Rhodes said his organization hopes that “the Supreme Court will use this opportunity to defend the right to keep and bear arms as the founders intended.”

“While we wish the Supreme Court would be as quick to weigh in when the courts uphold gun control as it has been to step in when the 5th Circuit strikes it down, it is our hope the Supreme Court will use this opportunity to restore the rights of millions of law-abiding Americans who have been targeted under this unjust law,” Rhodes said.

ON MY CALENDAR

Tuesday, Oct. 21: The Cato Institute hosts a free speech debate.
Thursday, Oct. 23: The Intercollegiate Studies Institute hosts an evening with Calley Means.

THREE MORE THINGS

Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) on Monday floated the use of the “nuclear option” to end the shutdown and get around Senate filibuster rules that require a 60-vote majority to reopen the government — a notable stance from the vocal hardliner. “We need to be taking a look at the 60 vote threshold. We really do,” Roy told reporters. “At a minimum, why don’t we take a look at it for CRs?” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) has been calling to use the nuclear option, too, but GOP leaders have so far dismissed that idea — since the filibuster has protected the GOP priorities in Democratic majorities.
President Trump made an in vitro fertilization announcement last week, calling himself the “father of IVF” as he announced a deal with a pharmaceutical company to lower the cost of some fertility drugs, and new federal guidance to encourage employers to offer fertility coverage. Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America, said in a statement: ““Any policy in this space, from the White House or Congress, must treat the lives of the smallest children in the highest regard … Too often, the IVF industry is given blanket immunity — despite growing numbers of horror stories like rogue practitioners switching embryos, ignoring basic safety standards, or negligently destroying embryos.” More from my colleague Joseph Choi here.
False flag flag? Rep. Dave Taylor (R-Ohio) said last week that the swastika inside of an American flag pictured in his office this week was “indistinguishable from an ordinary American flag to the naked eye,” and that his office was targeted as part of a “ruse” that sent the flag to multiple GOP offices. I confirmed that a similar American flag with a swastika was delivered to at least one other House GOP office earlier this year, which discarded the flag. I’ve not seen or inspected the flag in question, but I’ve asked to do so. GOP staffers, if you have one of these flags, ping me, I want to see it: ebrooks@thehill.com