George Santos never filed a key financial disclosure. Enforcement has been lax for years.
The fact that such violations are rarely even flagged makes it easy for candidates like Santos to avoid disclosing key financial information, ethics experts say.
A financial disclosure form that now-Rep. George Santos was supposed to file in 2021 might have offered key insight into the embattled congressman’s finances at a pivotal point in his campaign. The problem: he didn’t file it.
The missing financial disclosure is the subject of an ethics complaint two New York Democrats filed against Santos earlier this year and part of a bipartisan House panel’s investigation into him. Though it was obvious at the time Santos had missed the deadline in 2021, the issue did not attract much attention until after he had been elected to Congress and a series of resume fabrications and paper filing snafus began to surface.
Still, Santos was far from the only one to not submit the filing. Dozens of candidates who should have filed financial disclosures over the past two election cycles avoided doing so, or filed the forms late without asking for an extension, according to a POLITICO review of House ethics disclosures and Federal Election Commission filings. In many cases, candidates did not file the forms until after advancing from competitive primary elections, meaning voters did not have access to information about their finances before casting their ballots.
The vast majority of candidates who failed to file the financial disclosures on time have not otherwise been accused of wrongdoing. In many cases, they are first-time candidates who may be inexperienced with the federal system. But the fact that such violations are rarely even flagged and penalties are essentially non-existent makes it easy for candidates like Santos to avoid disclosing key financial information, ethics experts say.
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A financial disclosure form that now-Rep. George Santos was supposed to file in 2021 might have offered key insight into the embattled congressman’s finances at a pivotal point in his campaign. The problem: he didn’t file it.https://t.co/9whKn7CzS8
— POLITICO (@politico) March 19, 2023
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