0:00

Pushkin. LinkedIn

0:10

will help connect you with professionals you can't

0:12

find anywhere else, even people who

0:14

aren't actively looking for a new job. In

0:17

a given month, over 70% of

0:19

LinkedIn users don't visit other leading

0:21

job sites. So if you're

0:23

not looking at LinkedIn, you're looking in the wrong

0:26

place. Hire professionals like

0:28

a professional and post your job for

0:30

free at linkedin.com. That's linkedin.com.

0:37

Post your job for free. Terms

0:40

and conditions apply. The

0:42

most innovative companies are going further

0:44

with T-Mobile for Business. Tractor

0:47

Supply trusts 5G solutions

0:49

from T-Mobile. Together

0:51

they're connecting over 2200 stores

0:54

with 5G business internet

0:57

and powering AI so

0:59

team members can match shoppers with

1:01

the products they need faster. This

1:04

is enriching customer experience. This

1:06

is Tractor Supply with

1:08

T-Mobile for Business. Take

1:11

your business further

1:13

at t-mobile.com/now. Sauron

1:17

has returned. Sauron

1:27

will fall. You can't kill

1:29

me. War is coming to

1:31

Middle-earth. I will not stop

1:33

until he is destroyed. No! Every

1:36

soul is in peril. Shall we

1:38

begin? The Lord of the

1:40

Rings. The Rings of Power. New season August 29th.

1:43

Only on Prime Video. Hey this is

1:46

Jake Halpern. In case you

1:48

haven't heard, the big news is that

1:50

former Congressman George Santos, who's facing a

1:52

host of criminal charges, has said he

1:54

will take a plea later

1:56

today. And by chance,

1:59

also today. we're dropping our

2:01

new season, which is all about George

2:03

Santos. And it will tell you

2:05

everything that happened, all the crazy

2:07

twists and turns that led up to

2:09

this exact moment. So, sit

2:12

back, listen, and enjoy.

2:16

So, Jake. Yeah. Let me take you

2:19

back to January 2023. It's

2:21

a couple weeks after George Santos has been

2:24

exposed, and he shows up in Washington,

2:26

D.C. That was the

2:28

first day I saw him in person. I

2:30

remember we were walking through the Cannon

2:33

House Office Building, and you

2:35

could hear a pin drop. Because

2:37

people were like, that's George Santos. Did

2:39

you see it? That was George Santos. This

2:41

is Nesa Woomer. She was

2:43

George Santos's communications director. You

2:46

heard from her in our first episode. She

2:48

was actually hired back in December of 2022.

2:52

And her first day, and the

2:54

first day she would actually meet Santos in

2:57

person, came in January. The

2:59

amount of reporters and cameras that were outside

3:02

of our office, it reminded me of something

3:04

that you would see, like, back

3:06

in the 90s, like, with when Princess

3:09

Diana would show up somewhere. Wow.

3:12

This was Nesa's first day on the

3:14

job as the communications director, whatever. But

3:16

it was also George Santos's basically first

3:18

day. I mean, the scandal's happening, but

3:21

he hasn't even started his tenure as

3:23

a congressman. Or he's just starting. Correct.

3:26

Yeah. Their first day is the same first day.

3:28

And the press are also camped outside

3:31

the office on that first day. And

3:33

they remain outside the office, even

3:36

as the weeks drag on. They're not

3:38

really losing interest in the George Santos story. I've

3:41

had multiple meetings with, you

3:44

know, individual reporters, and

3:46

they're all saying the same thing. We

3:49

can't leave until he speaks to

3:51

the press. Until we get a

3:53

soundbite, we have to stay. And I

3:55

said, well, we're going to fix this. So

3:59

she realizes. okay, well, this is

4:01

not dying down. We're gonna book him on some

4:03

big name show. He's gonna do a long

4:06

sit-down interview with a respected

4:08

journalist, and we're gonna prep him

4:11

for that. And we're gonna spend this time, before

4:13

we have the interview even set up, we're gonna spend

4:15

time prepping. The hard part

4:17

was getting him to sit down and prep. He

4:20

was very just all over the place.

4:22

And so I put

4:24

out like this little list of like, the

4:26

15 lies that I've already heard in the

4:28

news, because as I said, at this time,

4:30

it was just, you

4:32

know, obviously his background from,

4:34

you know, work, family, religion,

4:39

and then the new stuff that was popping up. What

4:42

are the burning questions of the burning issues

4:44

at this particular moment that people wanna ask

4:46

him at this point? The press

4:48

is looking into a bunch

4:50

of allegations that have come to light.

4:52

And one of those stories is that

4:54

Santos had faced multiple evictions in New

4:56

York, while also claiming

4:59

publicly that he was a landlord. So

5:01

there's an inherent contradiction there. That

5:04

seems like so telling that he's being evicted, and

5:06

yet he's claiming to be a landlord.

5:09

This is just stark contrast. Yeah.

5:13

There's also new info and new allegations

5:15

coming out, basically on a

5:17

daily basis. A New Jersey veteran

5:19

says that the congressman organized a

5:21

fundraiser for his dying service dog

5:23

back in 2016, only to pocket

5:26

the money himself. In Brazil, a

5:28

local performer claims Santos was Katara

5:30

Ravash, and that he once performed

5:32

as a drag queen, something the

5:34

New York congressman strongly denies. Patch

5:37

Media reports, quote, "'Two former Santos'

5:39

roommates told Patch "'several items went

5:41

missing while they lived with Santos,

5:43

"'including phones, expensive dress shirts, "'and

5:45

checks from a checkbook.'" So

5:48

it's just basically like every time Nesa turns around,

5:50

there's a new story that she has to scramble,

5:53

figure out what their statement is gonna

5:55

be, and follow up with all the

5:57

journalists that are asking her questions. So

6:02

when Nesa is prepping him for

6:04

this interview, what's

6:07

her take on it? Does she feel that

6:09

he is being like forthright

6:11

with her? Does she still have faith

6:13

in him as someone who is

6:16

credible or not? I

6:18

think Nesa is stepping into this role and saying,

6:20

I have been hired to do a job and

6:23

I'm going to do the best job I can

6:25

do despite the

6:27

circumstances. And Nesa

6:29

told me that Santos was always

6:31

in tainting to her in their private

6:34

conversations, that he had answers for all

6:36

of these things. And

6:38

so when she's in that

6:40

position where this is her boss, she

6:43

wants to believe him and she wants to have his back

6:46

and she wants to set him up for success because her

6:48

boat's tied to his. Oh

6:51

my God, it's just like, even

6:55

though I was with him for five months, it probably felt

6:57

like 500 years at that point. And

7:01

my joke is always, my

7:03

theme song every day felt like was

7:06

the Led Zeppelin song, When the Levee Breaks.

7:09

It's just waiting for that to happen.

7:11

So, oh wait, it did. ["When

7:13

the Levee Breaks"] So

7:24

in this episode, we're going to get into

7:26

what Nesa and others would come to learn

7:28

about George Santos while trying to

7:30

sort fact from fiction. Stories

7:33

that he's told about his family, specifically

7:36

his mother. And

7:38

while these stories are not necessarily

7:40

related to the charges against him,

7:43

I think they reveal something deeper about his

7:45

character. And there's one

7:48

story he told in particular

7:51

that really struck a nerve. This

7:53

is Deep Cover, George Santos, episode

7:56

two, The Congressman. There

8:04

are a few people in this world you

8:06

should not lie to, your lawyer, your doctor,

8:08

and your communications director. By

8:10

the way, I would ideally include spouse in

8:12

there as well. Just

8:15

saying, just saying. Spoken

8:18

like a true husband. Okay. So

8:20

how does it go when she tries to prep him? Just

8:22

getting him to sit down and prep was always, it was like,

8:24

it's like getting a child to sit down and do their homework.

8:27

So very hard. But

8:30

she does get the chance to prep him

8:32

briefly. And at a

8:34

certain point in these conversations, the

8:36

tone shifts. I'd say one

8:38

of the hardest conversations I had was

8:42

the death of his mother. So

8:44

in 2021, George Santos tweeted,

8:46

9-11 claimed my mother's life. And

8:53

in the aftermath of the New

8:56

York Times reporting, people

8:58

find that tweet and

9:00

they start asking more questions about

9:02

that. And it was

9:05

actually mentioned on Santos's campaign website. It's

9:07

actually still on his website to this

9:09

day. It says, quote,

9:11

George's mother was in her office

9:14

in the South Tower on

9:16

September 11th, 2001,

9:19

when the horrific events of that day unfolded.

9:22

And it goes on to say, she

9:24

survived the tragic events on September

9:26

11th, but she passed away a

9:28

few years later when she lost her battle to

9:30

cancer. And

9:32

this is one of the allegations against him

9:34

that this is not true. People

9:37

do not find evidence to substantiate the fact that

9:39

his mother was there. And

9:42

Nisa knows that this is something he's going to

9:44

get asked about. So in her

9:47

attempts to prep him, this is something that they

9:49

talk about in detail. Wait, what are the holes

9:51

that people are poking in this story, at least

9:53

initially, or are there any? So when

9:55

Santos's tweet comes to light, there's a lot of

9:57

questions because when you say 9-11. claim

10:00

my mother's life, that

10:03

seems to imply that your mother died on 9-11? Yeah,

10:06

that's what I thought when you read it. Yeah,

10:08

and then it quickly becomes clear through

10:11

reporting and just public records that his

10:13

mother died in 2016. And

10:15

one of the things we had talked about

10:17

with him was just did she... because I

10:20

saw the timeline of her death. And I

10:22

had thought, well, I

10:24

remembered John Stewart was starting to highlight

10:26

a lot of problems that, like, first

10:29

responders were starting to die as a result of

10:31

9-11 from exposure to the ash and dust that

10:33

came from the

10:37

World Trade Center. So,

10:40

Nesa in that moment understands

10:42

that maybe it was just

10:44

an error in how Santos chose to phrase

10:47

the tweet, but that his

10:49

mother died in 2016 from cancer, which

10:53

was linked to her time at Ground Zero. That was

10:55

the claim that Santos was making. Nesa is saying, okay,

10:57

if you're going to be making this claim in

11:00

public, then let's break it down. Let's

11:03

talk through the details of this because you will be asked about

11:05

it. Right, and it seems

11:08

like he can kind of make

11:10

that argument somewhat credibly because on the website

11:12

it's saying she

11:14

passed away a few years later when she

11:16

lost her battle to cancer. It

11:18

seems to me like he's actually got some cover here. Yes,

11:21

and she's quickly picking up on what he's

11:23

saying, which is that, no, no,

11:25

no, I'm claiming that she died later as

11:27

a result of her exposure to Ground Zero.

11:30

Okay. But Nesa wants

11:33

details. And

11:35

I asked him, I said, did she die as a

11:37

result of 9-11? And he said,

11:39

yes. I said, okay, so let's just break it

11:41

down. Was she in the north or

11:43

the south tower? And he said, the south tower. I

11:46

said, all right. So she was in the south tower on September

11:48

11th. Okay. Do

11:50

you remember what floors she worked on? And

11:53

he just said, you know, she worked for a cleaning

11:55

company. So I did not have the, he did not

11:57

give out the specific floors. I think he. I

12:00

think he tried to say it was

12:02

like the 34th or something. And I

12:04

said, okay, well, so she

12:06

did work in the World Trade Center. And he said, yes. I

12:09

said, all right. So she

12:12

got out of the building. Yes,

12:14

she got out of the building. I

12:16

said, okay, so she escaped. She's safe.

12:20

And I said, but was she exposed to

12:22

the dust? And

12:25

he said, yes. And I thought, okay. So

12:28

finally, this is starting to make sense

12:30

for Nessa. She can understand the narrative

12:32

that Santos has been telling. And

12:35

even though he doesn't have all of the details, Nessa

12:38

is advising him, this is a

12:40

powerful story. This is

12:42

an experience that people can

12:44

relate to. People

12:46

will want to see a human side to you like

12:48

that. And I said, maybe that's just something you should

12:50

talk about. It's

12:53

interesting, because I heard that tape. And

12:56

I hear her kind of

12:58

poking a little bit too. Well, right. She's

13:00

doing her job. She's saying, I'm trying to

13:02

prep you for these interviews. Here's all of the

13:04

questions that you may be asked about this.

13:07

So let's try to get some specifics down,

13:09

right? And

13:12

then a few weeks later, I

13:14

think the New York Times or MSNBC

13:17

had reached out and said they had found proof

13:19

that she wasn't in the country. And

13:22

I thought, oh my God, this is, why

13:26

are you doing this? It

13:29

just, I thought, why?

13:31

Like, why? I

13:35

mean, that's the question, right? Does

13:37

she have any answer to that

13:39

question? I would argue Nessa

13:41

is still looking for her why. And

13:44

Nessa isn't the only one that's trying

13:46

to make sense out of all this. The

13:49

guy that I think has gone the deepest down

13:51

the rabbit hole is a

13:53

journalist named Marc Giussano. And

13:55

what he's found reshaped the way I think

13:57

about George Santos. That's

13:59

it.