EXCLUSIVE Why disgraced George Santos is pleading for solitary confinement as he desperately seeks last-minute Trump pardon

Daily Mail​

23-07-2025

Former Republican Rep. George Santos reports to jail on Friday - where he'll be serving a seven-year sentence for wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
The fabulist gay ex-New York lawmaker sat down in the Poconos for an episode of the new podcast Sources Say with Juliegrace Brufke where he claimed a group of Republican members - mostly from New York - have pushed House Speaker Mike Johnson to tell President Donald Trump not to pardon him, an assertion several of them have denied.
He also insisted in excerpts shared exclusively with the Daily Mail that he still wants to serve his time in protective custody instead of being forced to spend time with the general prison population.
'I'd rather be seven years alone then risk rape, gang-banged, shivved, killed, strangled, bullied,' he told Brufke, a Capitol Hill reporter with 24Sight News. 'It's a death sentence most likely for a gay man, look at the statistics. It's the truth,' he later added.
During his first six months in office for the second time, Trump has embraced his role as pardoner-in-chief, doling out pardons to some controversial convicts including Virginia Sheriff Scott Jenkins, who was handing out deputy sheriff badges in exchange for cash.
Trump also pardoned reality TV star couple Todd and Julie Chrisley, but Santos complained, 'I can't get past the gatekeepers,' to make the plea to the Republican president for himself.
'And I've tried relentlessly, but unfortunately I hit a wall when, you know - he denies it, he denies it, he denied it to me in text but I don't believe him unfortunately, Mike Johnson, a lot of people have said he's being, I guess, coerced by Nick LaLota, Andrew Garbarino, Mike Lawler and Nick Langworthy and Nicole Malliotakis, along with Max Miller, to not pardon me or else they would vote down the agenda,' Santos claimed.
LaLota, Garbarino, Lawler, Langworthy and Malliotakis all represent New York, like Santos did during his short tenure in Congress, while Miller, who served in the president's first administration, is a congressman from Ohio.
'This accusation by George Santos is categorically false. Santos is a convicted fraudster whose credibility ranks somewhere between Pinocchio and Bernie Madoff. Congressman Lawler has never engaged in such discussions, period,' Lawler's communications director Ciro Riccardi told the Daily Mail.
Langworthy's spokesperson added, 'No, he did not do that.'
Johnson's office also denied Santos' bold claim.
'This allegation is unequivocally false. At no time has the Speaker had any conversations with the Trump Administration or anyone else regarding any potential pardon of Mr. Santos. Nor has he expressed any opinion on the matter one way or another to anyone, because the Speaker had no knowledge of the matter whatsoever,' a spokesperson told the Daily Mail.
Johnson had also voted against expelling Santos from Congress in 2023 because of the precedent it would set, arguing the decision was for the congressman's constituents to decide.
The other GOP lawmakers' offices had yet to respond to the Daily Mail's requests for comment.
'I think it's so political and some people have true, true hatred for me, I don't think it's likely at this point,' Santos said of a Trump pardon.
Even before Santos was sworn-in in January 2023, The New York Times had revealed that he had fabricated parts of his resume - including working for Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. He also never attended Baruch College, where he claimed he had graduated from in 2010.
A federal investigation uncovered that Santos had falsified reports to the Federal Election Commission and stolen the personal identity and financial information of contributors to his campaign, among other crimes.
He was expelled from Congress in December 2023 - and sentenced to 87 months in April of this year.
'I'm not handling it well,' Santos admitted. 'As the days approach and I don't hear anything ... I've said, don't pardon me, commute my sentence, if restitution is what they want, I'll pay the restitution, but seven years is a political sentence.'
Santos said 'of course' he's remorseful for the actions that will put him behind bars, adding, 'I hate people telling me that they know how I feel. That's just insane. It's arrogant, it's preposterous.'
'Look what I did to my own life? You'd think that I'm not remorseful?' he asked. 'Only those who are with me in my intimate setting on a day to day know how much I sit back and I cry sometimes myself to sleep of not just remorse but of - like I repent like everything.'
'If I could do it all over again it would be so different, not because I got caught, because I was blinded by ambition and I did so much stupid, right? In the name of what? Becoming a congressman. It's not even that cool,' he added.
It has yet to be made public where Santos will be serving time - and won't be until he arrives, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons - but he described it as 'not the type of facility you would expect someone like me to go.'
'You'd expect to see me go to a place a lot more chill, right? They're putting me in somewhere the opposite,' he revealed.
He said he's going into prison 'kind of blind.'
'I have spoken to other people who have gone to prison who are not former members of Congress,' he said. 'I don't want to make friends in there. Do I strike you like I want to make friends in prison?'
Santos said he even stopped his Botox regimen ahead of Friday.
'Who am I going to freeze my face for, f***ing inmates?' he said.