after a really tough year.
Matt Egan, thank you so much for
joining us with that.
>>> Turning to Washington now,
one week from today, a new
congress will get sworn in and
there will be one new face who
intends to take the oath who is
now admitting that he lied.
Incoming Republican congressman
George Santos did not graduate
from college.
He did not work at citigroup and
he did not work for Goldman
Sachs despite his resume saying
that he did.
>> Did I embellish my resume,
yes.
I'm not a fraud.
I'm not cartoon.
>> He falsely claimed his
grandparents survived the
holocaust.
He also falsely claimed he ran a
nonprofit and another falsehood
that he owned 13 properties.
He also admitted that the pulse
nightclub shooting victims never
worked for him that he claimed
they had.
With me is Laura ba ron-lopez
and norm Eisen.
This is really wild but what's
interesting is Republican
leaders have been kind of
silent.
New York -- Kevin Mccarthy has
said nothing.
Is leadership going to address
it at some point?
>> It's a really good question,
Abby.
Right now with lawmakers gone,
they're not in Washington, D.C.
They've returned to their homes.
They're not in session.
All likelihood is that they
continue to remain silent for
awhile.
And really it's difficult to see
Kevin Mccarthy trying to take
any aggressive action against
this incoming lawmaker because
Santos has said he intends to
try to take his seat and be
sworn in in early January and
right now Kevin Mccarthy needs
every vote he can possibly get
to become speaker.
Right now Republicans are about
to take a 222 majority to
Democrats' 213 and Mccarthy can
only lose about four votes if he
wants to become speaker and
right now there are roughly five
freedom caucus far right members
who are saying they aren't going
to vote for him so he would need
Santos' vote desperately if he
wants to become speaker.
There are a number of Democrats
who are already calling for
Santos' expulsion which would
require a two-thirds vote
majority in the house.
They're calling for him to
undergo a house ethics
investigation or simply resign
before he's sworn in but right
now he's saying he's not going
to do that.
>> And, norm, Santos' adamant he
didn't do anything illegal, but
there are some really
significant questions about
false statements, perhaps given
to government entities and also
the curious case of his
finances.
He went from being, you know,
not that wealthy to loaning his
own campaign about $700,000.
What are the red flags you're
seeing there?
>> Abby, number one, he's filed
forms making financial claims
with congress, with the federal
election commission and if those
claims, we don't know the answer
yet but if those statements, for
example, about over $700,000
that he supposedly got from this
business of his that he then
loaned his campaign, if those
are as inaccurate as the other
things he said, he faces
potential investigation for mail
and wire fraud, for false
campaign statements, those are
investigated and prosecuted
often, false transfers so a
variety of federal legal
restrictions as well as those
house ethics rules you're not
allowed to tell these kinds of
fausthoods.
These are serious red flags.
If when I was working in the
white house or when I was
serving as ambassador, we'd had
this pattern of lies that have
already been documented by any
employee, they would have been
immediately marched out of the
building, Abby, because of the
security risk and then finally,
myself as the child of a
holocaust survivor and a
holocaust refugee, what a
terrible lie that is.
What an insult to the memory of
the 6 million that --
>> Yeah, he says it was -- that
he called himself jew-ish, not
jewish.
It seems like the response to
this by a lot of Republicans is
as long as he votes the party
line in Washington and
apologizes it's all fine.
I mean, do you think this is how
this could end up that someone
whose background is almost
completely fabricated could be a
member in good standing?
>> I do.
I think that that's the point
that the party has reached right
now in terms of we've seen in
cases where members have done
other things like they've
appeared at white nationalist
conferences or they're made
repeated racist statements and
Kevin Mccarthy has decided not
to hold them responsible, has
actually said that he would
reinstate members like that on
their committees when they
regain control and it appears as
though that could be the same
case for Santos.
Now, you know, norm would know
better than I do about whether
or not those legal -- the
potential illegalities here
could prevent him from doing
that but right now it looks as
though we're headed for George
Santos becoming a member of