Lying Long Island Rep. George Santos finally admitted to dressing up as a woman in the past— though he denied he was a “drag queen” while talking to reporters at LaGuardia Airport on Saturday.
“No, I was not a drag queen in Brazil, guys. I was young and I had fun at a festival. Sue me for having a life,” the embattled Republican congressman said, in his first public response since allegations that he performed as a drag queen named Kitara emerged last week.
Santos, who is openly gay, had repeatedly tried to shoot down the reports of his cross-dressing past, which emerged last week after a photo from 2008 was posted online by Eula Rochard, a drag queen in Brazil and former friend of Santos.
A video also surfaced of what appeared to be the freshman rep clad in a black dress and sunglasses, boasting about performing as a drag queen at the Pride parade in the Rio suburb of Niteroi in 2005.
Santos and Rochard reportedly met when Rochard was already an established drag queen in a Brazilian city next to Rio de Janeiro. She said he went by “Anthony” when she knew him and that he “lied about everything.”
She said Santos — who has also gone by the name Anthony Devolder — was never a professional drag performer because “he did not have what it takes.”
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While Santos denied earlier this week that he “performed as a drag queen,” he has not denied that he is the person in the photos and videos.
“The most recent obsession from the media claiming that I am a drag Queen or “performed” as a drag Queen is categorically false,” Santos tweeted on Thursday. “The media continues to make outrageous claims about my life while I am working to deliver results. I will not be distracted nor fazed by this.”
When contacted by The Post about the 2005 video, Santos responded in a text message: “Absolutely false and just another bit of nonsense from the pile-on effect I’m dealing with.”
Santos has been caught in a seemingly never-ending web of lies about his college education, employment history, ethnicity and other aspects of his life.
Among his more outrageous claims are that his mother died in the Sept. 11 attacks and that his grandparents escaped Nazi persecution in Europe during WWII. In reality, his grandparents and his mother were in Brazil during both of those tragedies, according to immigration records.
Santos ignored multiple questions from reporters regarding the lies about his family on Saturday.
He had just returned from a visit to Washington D.C. where he attended a meeting on Friday night, CNN reported. He refused to say who he met with, calling it “classified.”
Both Democrats and Republicans have called for Santos to resign. Regardless, the GOP House Steering Committee placed him on two committees this week: Small Business and Science, Space and Technology.
