Just When You Thought Republicans’ Defenses of George Santos Couldn’t Get Any Worse …

Republican Rep. George Santos being a (un)Talented Mr. Ripley fascinates me. He is a terrible person who lied profusely about everything (!) and was caught in his lies almost immediately upon gaining the national spotlight because they were not smart lies. In fact, they were deeply dumb lies and anyone with an ounce of common sense and access to Google could have verified them within 10 minutes—and did, but only after he won his election. He’s currently under investigation on not one, but two continents! It’s clear he has no idea what he’s doing, and somehow, he managed to convince a district of 145,824 people to vote for him despite overwhelming evidence that the Republicans had no real plan if they actually got control of Congress (as evidenced by how smoothly the process of electing the Speaker went.)

He’s not harmless, but also, he’s not scary. I feel like he’s some kind of predator that is slow moving and easily avoidable who, in the course of trying to attack you, would somehow manage to not only knock himself out in the process but also to pull his own pants down, live stream it, and then soil himself, thus utterly humiliating himself while you look on confused. In short, he’s a grifter only the most easily deceived among us would fall for—a Republican voter if you will.

With that in mind, it’s time for Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX) to tell you not to worry about George Santos, and that there are other, bigger things to worry about:

Per The Daily Beast:

On Face the Nation, Rep. Tony Gonzales (R-TX) took the most absurd outlook, claiming that the nation should ignore Santos’ completely fabricated biography in light of his colleagues’ own penchant for lying.

“Look, there’s a lot of frauds in Congress,” Gonzales said. “I mean, George Santos is the least of this country’s worries.”

"Do you think he should be removed from office?" @margbrennan asks GOP Rep. Tony Gonzales about New York Congressman George Santos.

"Look, there's a lot of frauds in Congress," Gonzales says. "I mean, George Santos is the least of this country's worries." pic.twitter.com/Qte0JEVyzy

— Face The Nation (@FaceTheNation) January 8, 2023

Ok, first off, if I were to make a joke here I would tell you that finding Bigfoot to solve the Goblin King’s riddle in order to find the golden chalice to solve climate change is clearly our country’s biggest worry. I’m not going to do that (because it would piss off the Goblin King and his missions must be conducted in complete secrecy). What I am going to do is point out that Rep. Gonzales is putting party over country, and given the chaos we saw last week during the speaker nomination process, I don’t really understand why? At least get in a potshot here. Call Rep. Santos a weird little guy and say he smells like cheese. The chances of him seeing his term out are slim to none, man. I’m basing this on the number of investigations underway on him alone right now. Do you like the guy? Probably not. What’s to like! We already know Kevin McCarthy sold his soul to be Speaker of the House, so anything he says to you has no weight. Let him scold you or disinvite you to the Republican pizza and movie night. You can just call for a vote for him to step down as Speaker and he has to abide by it.

Instead, Rep. Gonzales is doing the old “drain the swamp” schtick which might have more weight if we didn’t just spend the entirety of last week laughing at the Republicans almost physically fighting on the House floor while the Dems ran a tight ship, and made them look ridiculous. Basically, by maintaining an old party line, not only did he deprive me, personally, of a good dig in at a weird bad dude who lies a lot, but he also inadvertently took a jab at his own party. Way to go, bro!

(image: Win McNamee/Getty Images)