As George Santos’ fraud trial fast approaches, the former Republican congressman wants prospective jurors to fill out a questionnaire to determine what they already think of him — but prosecutors argue that the request comes too late and that Santos thirsts for the very spotlight he complains about.
In court filings last week, Santos’s defense team pointed to the more than 1,500 articles they found in several newspapers and to a flurry of media references — including comedian Bowen Yang’s impression of him on “Saturday Night Live.”
“For all intents and purposes, Santos has already been found guilty in the court of public opinion. Since December 2022, Santos has been relentlessly criticized by the media, often being branded as deceitful, fraudulent, a ‘liar,’ ‘fraud,’ and ‘con artist,’ his lawyers wrote.
They also pointed out that the court required jury questionnaires in the criminal trials of Donald Trump, former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, and Derek Chauvin, the Minnesota cop convicted of killing George Floyd.
“Specifically the media often portrays him in a negative light as a liar, fraud, and manipulator. Outlets have gone so far as to say ‘Santos lies like people breathe,’ while alleging a multitude of ‘cons and deceptions,’” his lawyers wrote.
Prosecutors pushed back hard against the request, arguing that 850 prospective jurors have already been told to report to the federal courthouse in Long Island for the start of Santos’ trial on Sept. 9.
“The government is aware of no mechanism to require those jurors to appear at an earlier time for the purpose of completing a questionnaire; Santos’s request, therefore, is effectively to adjourn the trial,” federal prosecutors wrote on Friday, adding that Santos could have made the request months ago.
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Barry Williams/for New York Daily News Congressman George Santos leaves the U.S. Eastern District New York court on May 10, 2023, in Central Islip, L.I. (Barry Williams for New York Daily News)
Prosecutors also called the publicity surrounding Santos “largely a product of his own making” and said he shouldn’t be rewarded for “deliberate and self-serving attempts to gain notoriety.”
“The impropriety of granting Santos’s request is especially clear in light of what Santos has spent the past nine months doing, namely, courting the press and ginning up the very media attention he now laments may unfairly influence jurors,” prosecutors wrote.
They mention a Dec. 18 interview with late-night talk show host Ziwe Fumudoh where Santos “boasted that he would continue making public appearances because ‘people want the content.’”
Prosecutors listed a number of other high-profile defendants whose cases didn’t need written jury questionnaires, including former N.J. Sen. Bob Menendez and “Pharma Bro” Martin Shkreli.
Santos, who lied about nearly every aspect of his life during his successful run for office in 2022, was booted from Congress in December. He faces multiple fraud and identity theft charges, including allegations he stole people’s identities and made unauthorized charges on campaign donors’ credit cards to buy designer clothes and pay personal debts.
Prosecutors are asking to use those lies against him in trial, arguing in a motion earlier this month that “his curated (and false) public persona was central to his congressional campaign and related political activities.”
He’s slated to next appear for a pre-trial conference in his case before Long Island Federal Court Judge Joanna Seybert on Tuesday.