Santos rules out running for office for the next decade

After his sentence was commuted by President Trump, former Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) said Sunday he does not expect to run for office in the next decade.

“I can tell you this, not that I can see of in the next decade. I’m all politicked out,” Santos told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union” regarding a political comeback.

On Friday, the president commuted the former congressman’s seven-year prison sentence for wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. Santos, 37, pleaded guilty to the charges in August 2024 and reported to a New Jersey federal corrections facility in June.

Santos was expelled by the House in December 2023, less than a year into his first term, amid the allegations. 

On Sunday, Santos said he was “humbled” by his time in prison and wears “the scorn of my poor choices and my poor decisions.” He added that if he is still required by law to pay $370,000 in restitution to those he defrauded during his initial run for Congress, he will do so. 

According to a copy of the commutation U.S. Pardon Attorney Ed Martin posted to the social platform X on Friday, Santos no longer needs to pay the restitution.

“I have been granted a second chance,” Santos said on Sunday. “I have made a very concise decision to apply that for good and use that to make amends with my community, with my friends, with my family and those who I have left a sour taste in their mouth.” 

The former GOP lawmaker also said that during his conversation with Trump after the president commuted his sentence, he expressed a willingness to work on prison reform in “real human ways.”

“How can I be a voice of helping change a system that needs desperate changing to help rehabilitation? Prison is not rehabilitating anybody. It’s actually creating recidivism because it’s not doing what it’s supposed to do,” Santos added.