Staffer for Rep. George Santos pleads guilty to wire fraud in donor scam

A staffer for Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., charged with impersonating an aide to former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to solicit donors has pleaded guilty to fraud, in the latest legal blow to the embattled freshman congressman.

Sam Miele, 27, who pleaded guilty Tuesday to a federal wire fraud charge, also admitting to making about $100,000 worth of fraudulent credit card charges, with the money going into Santos' campaign and his own pockets. He could face 27 to 33 months in prison, based on federal guidelines, when he's sentenced April 30.

He was indicted in Long Island Federal Court on charges he impersonated McCarthy's now-retired chief of staff, Dan Meyer, to dupe donors into giving Santos money during the 2020 and 2022 election cycles.

Though Santos and Meyer were not mentioned by name in the indictment, sources familiar with the case confirmed the charges stemmed from that impersonation.

Miele's plea comes just over a month after Santos' campaign treasurer, Nancy Marks, pleaded guilty to federal fraud charges.

It's not clear if Miele has agreed to cooperate against Santos.

When Miele hooked a donor, their contributions were sent through an intermediary service into Santos' campaign accounts, and Miele got a 15% cut, according to the indictment.

"The defendant used fraud and deceit to steal more than $100,000 from his victims, funneling this money into the campaign committees of candidates for the House, and into his own pockets," U.S. Attorney Breon Peace said Tuesday.

As part of his guilty plea, Miele must pay $109,171 in restitution, $69,136 in forfeiture and a separate stipulated payment of $470,000 to a campaign contributor.

"Sam Miele is an intelligent young man with a bright future who made an unfortunate mistake. He has taken full responsibility for his actions and looks forward to putting this episode behind him and getting on with his life," his lawyer Kevin Marino said Tuesday.

Santos, who lied about nearly every aspect of his life as he successfully ran for Congress in 2022, faces a cascade of fraud and identity theft charges, including a new indictment last month accusing him of repeatedly charging his donors' credit cards without permission.

Santos was initially indicted in May on 13 criminal counts, including wire fraud, money laundering, theft of public funds and making false statements to Congress.

Those charges included allegations he collected COVID-related unemployment funds while working as an investment firm director, ran a bogus political action committee, used campaign donor money to buy designer clothes and pay his personal debts, and told a string of lies to Congress about his assets and income.

Federal prosecutors last month hit him with 10 new criminal counts, including conspiracy to commit offenses against the United States, wire fraud, making false statements and submitting false records to the Federal Election Commission, aggravated identity theft and access device fraud.

Those charges include accusations he repeatedly charged his contributors' credit cards without their authorization from December 2021 to August 2022, and lied about where the influx of campaign cash was coming from.

He's also accused of scheming to falsify Federal Election Commission filings to make it look like he had enough donor cash to qualify for financial and logistics support from an unnamed national campaign committee.

The truth-challenged Republican has vowed to stay in office and run for reelection in 2024. He survived an expulsion vote from Congress on Nov. 1.

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