Federal prosecutors on Long Island filed new criminal charges against Rep. Jorge Santos on Tuesday, accusing him of stealing people’s identities, charging donors’ credit cards without their authorization and lying to federal election officials.
Specifically, in Tuesday’s 23-count superseding indictment, Santos was charged with “two counts of wire fraud, two counts of materially false statements to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), two counts of falsifying records to obstruct the FEC, two counts of “Aggravated identity theft and one count of access device fraud,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York said in a news release.
“As alleged, Santos is accused of stealing people’s identities and charging his own donor credit cards without the donor’s authorization, lying to the Federal Election Commission and, in turn, lying to the public about his campaign’s finances. Santos falsely inflated reports about the campaign. “The receipts contained loans and donations that did not exist and were either fabricated,” Breon Peace, the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement. , or stolen. “This office will work tirelessly to pursue criminal charges against anyone who uses the election process as a way to defraud the public and our government institutions. “
The charges come after Santos’ former campaign treasurer Nancy Marquez was indicted last week. Prosecutors said they unknowingly recruited 10 family members to donate to the campaign to make it appear that Santos had enough support to qualify for party funds.
According to the charges, Santos allegedly loaned his campaign $500,000 while only having $8,000 on hand.
Rep. Santos’ attorney declined to comment when reached by ABC News.
When asked by Capitol Hill reporters if Santos would step down Tuesday night amid the new charges, he said: “I won’t.”
“I have no comment,” he added.
Santos was charged by federal prosecutors in the Eastern District with 13 criminal counts, including seven counts of wire fraud, three counts of money laundering, one count of theft of public funds and two counts of materially false statements to the House of Representatives. New York in May. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.
Santos will appear in court again on October 27.
-ABC News’ Will Steakin, Rachel Scott and Jolie Lash contributed to this report.
