Regardless of going through 23 federal prices for a litany of crimes, together with the sort that contain stealing — wire fraud, bank card fraud, and aggravated identification theft — individuals, together with at the very least one sitting US Senator, can not give former Rep. George Santos cash quick sufficient.
Since his expulsion from Congress, Santos has discovered a house on Cameo, a service that enables common individuals to pay extra well-known individuals, normally of the fact tv or character actor selection, to document video messages for his or her private use. For a small charge, you might ask Santos to inform your mother that you just love her or “roast” certainly one of your pals. Santos initially charged $75 however, after critical demand, upped his worth to $400, in response to Cameo (Actual Housewife of New York Metropolis Ramona Singer prices $125 per video). In accordance with Semafor, Santos has made extra money in 4 days of Cameo appearances than he would have in a single yr ($174,000) as a member of Congress.
A person who’s going through doable jail time for theft and who received thrown out of Congress is now being given money, hand over fist, to be that ex-congressional, money-stealing grifter on digicam.
What is going on? Is there no higher means for individuals to make use of their wallets? Is inflation not an issue? Maybe we’ve an excessive amount of cash?
Whereas we might by no means absolutely perceive what would compel an individual to ship Santos $200 of their hard-earned money, his last kind as a Cameo star is slightly simpler to elucidate. Anybody who has adopted Bravo’s “Scandoval” or The Bachelor may level out that this man’s profession arc is that of a actuality TV star. These individuals, Santos’s Cameo cohort, go on TV with the purpose of getting well-known sufficient to launch a enterprise, do social media influencing, or generate revenue by way of Cameo. Actual Housewives Jen Shah and Teresa Giudice, like Santos, confronted federal prices and are doing or have served jail time.
The one distinction between Bravo celebrities and Santos is that the latter’s actuality TV present was Congress. Maybe there’s no distinction in any respect.
“He’s clearly going to need to go on hiatus for a bit,” Vox senior politics reporter and Bravo watcher Christian Paz advised me, humoring me with TV communicate. Paz and I sat down to debate the person on everybody’s minds from our respective fields of experience — politics for him, actuality TV for me. However as Paz explains, whereas Santos may seem to be an anomaly, among the best methods to reach authorities is to behave like a actuality TV star. It’s truly designed that means.
The dialog beneath has been edited for size and readability.
Christian, on the Jen Shah scale of jail time, how a lot jail time is George Santos probably going through? Is it roughly time than Jen Shah? [Editor’s note: Shah was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison.]
He has the potential to serve much more time. The massive embarrassing stuff got here out from this ethics report, however that’s simply the Home Ethics report. George Santos continues to be beneath indictment and going through fairly extreme federal prices: wire fraud, identification theft, aggravated identification theft, mendacity to a federal workplace, cash laundering, and so on. These are issues that individuals go to jail for for a very long time.
Wire fraud! The whole lot I learn about wire fraud is from Jen Shah. In case you had a Venn diagram of crimes actual politicians do and crimes Actual Housewives do, wire fraud is a type of crimes the place there’s overlap.
I by no means thought we’d have federal prices in opposition to a congressman due to OnlyFans subscriptions. Although there was the misuse of taxpayer funds that occurred with Aaron Schock, the congressman from Illinois, famously.
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He made his total workplace like Downton Abbey!
Precisely. We’ve had some scandalous/actuality TV-adjacent scandals previously, however by no means as outright and simply brazen. And posting by way of it, as Santos is? Within the final 10 years, politics basically has simply turn into rather more actuality TV-esque.
I imply, what an ideal segue into what I need to discuss! There’s that saying, “Politics is Hollywood for ugly individuals.” I feel that the replace to that saying ought to be, “Politics is actuality tv.”
Yeah, I completely agree.
That politicians are ugly? [laughs]
No. That politics is actuality TV!
Consider among the institutional limits in Congress. The way in which that you just get entry to higher committee positions, the best way that you just get clout inside authorities, the best way to entry energy is thru displaying which you can fundraise, displaying you may have the connections to individuals who will assist the get together long run, having an enormous donor base, and one of many ways in which you are able to do that’s by getting consideration. The eye economic system is a very powerful option to get donor cash from the grassroots.
Whereas George Santos is a really particular form of consideration seize that includes crimes, I feel this common idea is kinda bipartisan. The way in which AOC and “The Squad” are branded will get consideration. Sen. John Fetterman’s social media presence too. On the opposite aspect of that, there’s Marjorie Taylor Inexperienced and Lauren Boebert. Everybody’s on social media, and I feel it’s simply extra apparent now — succeeding in politics is getting well-known.
AOC and people in The Squad have been ready to make use of social media very successfully, early on. And also you talked about this as a both-parties challenge — it’s. I’ve lined many freshman courses that enter Congress, and the primary factor that they need is clearly to win their subsequent election, however in addition they need consideration. They need stuff past simply the standard information protection. They need the invitations to the podcast. They need invitations to the speak exhibits, to the daytime speak exhibits. They need to be talked about on cable information. The priorities are typically to get consideration, particularly in case you’re within the minority.
As a result of if you’re within the political minority, you don’t essentially have policy-making energy?
Particularly within the Home, you don’t have a whole lot of energy if you’re within the minority. And that incentivizes cloud chasing — you recognize, little clips that go viral on TikTok, the interviews that get clipped from TV, cable information interviews that go viral on Twitter.
I don’t assume it’s a coincidence that you just noticed a whole lot of these right-wing social media influencer varieties come to prominence after they have been within the minority too. In 2020, Republicans have been within the minority, they didn’t have a whole lot of energy. And so what’s the choice? It’s to get as a lot consideration as you may.
You’ve gotten these institutional frames that form of drive politicians to search for this consideration as a result of they don’t have political energy. After which the eye will assist them as soon as they do get energy and are capable of rise. However then the opposite factor is that, in newer years, it’s turn into more durable for politicians in each events to climb the ranks as a result of so many individuals keep in highly effective positions for thus lengthy.
Whenever you don’t have a path to promotions inside the authorities, the following smartest thing is fame.
I feel we’d be remiss in not mentioning that the mannequin for “actuality tv and politics are the identical” was President Trump. A former actuality tv star who grew to become president, proper?
Quite a bit has been written and loads nonetheless stays to be written concerning the actuality TV star turned president. Lots of consideration has additionally been paid by way of the political lens to, “Who’s the following Trump? Who will succeed him?”
A giant a part of that fails to see the fact TV star aspect. It’s not only a populist enchantment. It’s additionally all of the issues that include being a actuality TV star that enhance him, just like the sense that he’s similar to you or that his supporters view him by way of the lens of fandom and never by way of the lens of a political motion. Lots of politicians and folks making an attempt to posture as “the following Trump” don’t have that.
I hold wrestling with the thought of politics being actuality TV, one side specifically: During the last decade and perhaps even longer, the entire thought behind actuality TV and why individuals take part has shifted.
Individuals go on exhibits like The Bachelor or Drag Race, however successful isn’t essentially the tip objective. It’s good, certain, however an increasing number of the objective of being on actuality TV isn’t successful. The objective is to get as well-known as you may, after which if you depart the present, get extra well-known and monetize that.
If you concentrate on George Santos, it looks like — barring a jail sentence — that he’s basically embodied this mannequin. He’s pivoted in a means that made him extra well-known and extra highly effective than he would have been had he gone by way of his profession as a congressman representing a district in New York.
The grift was the important thing to all of it. I completely see what you’re saying. He’s creating wealth off Cameo now. Perhaps it’ll be short-lived. However his stans are persevering with, and now we’ve Democratic Senators utilizing donor cash to ship to George Santos to troll political rivals on Cameo. On the root of it, it’s nonetheless cash from People going into George Santos’s pockets that he will get to maintain.
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If politics is really actuality TV, has the press protection modified in any respect? Is it nonetheless the identical?
The DC press capabilities very equally to Bravo blogs. I’ve written about this earlier than, like, the attention-grabbing overlap in how popular culture protection has bled into political protection and overlaying critical onerous information. The DC press likes to cowl something that’s remotely scandalous in any means. And with all of the profiles, all the next him round asking him questions, and all these memorable moments, in addition they helped to create this Santos persona.
Do you assume politics is the tip objective anymore for any of those politicians? And has that ever been true? It’s not onerous to think about former politicians and press secretaries who get guide offers, gigs on cable information, and other forms of contracts. Perhaps these issues simply look totally different now.
Previously, it was once about getting on TV or getting on boards or getting comfortable consulting jobs on Ok Avenue.
However within the digital present period, typically politics is just not actually what individuals are getting into politics for. There’s ideological causes for working. However, for instance, what number of members of Congress have podcasts? There are such a lot of extra choices within the leisure house to make a extra inventive profession by way of politics or after politics. And even the individuals round Trump, for instance, all of them both discovered guide offers, rehabilitated themselves to turn into commentators on cable information or launched their very own podcasts.
There’s simply this ecosystem that makes it profitable so that you can go into politics and never for politics’ sake. And what we’re seeing now could be a whole lot of it’s drifting right into a purely leisure path.
If there’s a parallel to that, it’s what number of Actual Housewives have bizarre aspect companies. And wire fraud!
A guide deal for a politician is sort of a Housewife promoting a candle or athletic put on. However George Santos received caught, whereas there are such a lot of other people who’re and can get away with it. They usually’ll be round for an additional season.
As somebody who covers politics, is that this flip actually miserable to you? Or has politics at all times been like this?
It’s positively been a actuality. However it’s miserable within the sense that I’m firmly within the camp that’s making an attempt to guard democracy and get individuals to consider within the system.
These sorts of grifts delegitimize the entire establishment. It reminds people that there’s a big class divide in America. And that’s a type of issues that at all times turns into obvious once we see cash grifts in politics as a result of it’s typically individuals making an attempt to get out of no matter stratification they’re in due to class. That’s why you grift and steal cash to search out methods to higher your self. And also you’re utilizing the general public and the electoral system to do it.
You’re simply harming that system much more.
