A homeless New Jersey veteran stated Wednesday that he’s sure Republican Rep. George Santos is the phony animal advocate who scammed him out of $3,000 that big-hearted donors chipped in to save lots of his dying canine.
“I acknowledged his face, and it simply turned my abdomen after I noticed him.” Richard Osthoff informed CNN concerning the mendacity Republican lawmaker.
Santos insisted he didn’t run off with the money earmarked for what ought to have been life-saving surgical procedure on Osthoff’s cancer-stricken pit bull named Sapphire.
“Pretend,” Santos texted Semafor, a information web site. “No clue who that is.”
However Osthoff, who served within the Navy, stated he has receipts within the type of a number of textual content messages from Anthony Devolder, a variant of Santos’s identify that the conservative congressman has sometimes used.
The now-defunct GoFundMe web page for the fundraiser lists Anthony Devolder as its creator.
Santos’s full identify is George Anthony Devolder Santos. His firm known as the Devolder Group.
He has sometimes launched himself as Anthony or George Devolder, like he did at a videotaped 2019 LGBTQ occasion to again Republicans, for causes that he has but to clarify.
The Osthoff scandal dates to 2016, a time when Santos claimed to be an official at an unregistered charity known as Pals of Pets United, in accordance with Patch, the location that broke the story.
At first Santos, who Osthoff claims launched himself as Anthony Devolder, was sympathetic and cooperative, particularly when it got here to organising the charity fundraiser, with the money going to the Pets United account, Osthoff stated.
When Osthoff tried to get the charity to pay for Sapphire’s surgical procedure it was a unique story. He made excuses for not paying up and claimed the pooch was “now not a candidate” for help.
Devolder claimed the cash raised would go to different sick canines — after which ghosted Osthoff altogether, in accordance with the veteran.
“He stopped answering my texts and calls,” Osthoff, 47, informed Patch.
With no cash to pay for surgical procedure, Osthoff watched in dismay as his canine companion grew sicker and sicker and finally needed to put her down in 2017.
“I liked that canine a lot,” he stated.
Osthoff’s heartbreaking allegation was one of many stranger tales revolving round Santos, who has admitted mendacity about his background.
Santos, who flipped a Lengthy Island congressional seat, even falsely claimed Jewish heritage and stated his grandparents fled the Holocaust.
Santos is resisting a refrain of requires his resignation, even from fellow Lengthy Island Republicans.
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