Former Rep. George Santos, R-N.Y., expressed deep gratitude Monday on Newsmax to President Donald Trump for commuting his federal prison sentence and criticized what he described as unfair media coverage of the president.
Santos served nearly three months of an 87-month prison sentence after his conviction on federal charges of wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in a scheme involving donor funds. He walked out of the federal correctional institute in Fairton, New Jersey, on Friday night.
On “Greg Kelly Reports,” Santos said that it has been “surreal” since his sentence was commuted Friday and that he spoke with Trump on Saturday.
“It’s a sense of shock and a sense of, wait, is this really happening?” Santos said. “I wake up in the middle of the night at 3 a.m. for the last three nights, just because that was the same time that in prison, they would do a check and they would come around with the flashlights, making sure we were in our beds.
“And my body is accustomed to that interruption. [Then] I wake up and, oh my God, I’m home. Same, same nightmare of being in the SHU [solitary confinement] and segregation has been following me now for the last week or so, even before I came home.
“So, it’s just been one very interesting journey. I mean, it’s humbling. I mean, God above all, as everybody knows, I’ve made that very clear.”
Santos framed Trump as a merciful leader willing to give second chances and said he is far from the person portrayed by the mainstream media.
“President Trump’s mercy and his willingness to give people like me and so many others a second chance is just something that I didn’t know,” Santos said. “I didn’t know how to feel when I spoke to the president on Saturday, other than just stutter and thank him for his kindness, for his humanity that he exudes.
“And I wish people would look at this man for who he actually is and stop doing what they do to him in the media. This is an amazing human being who has the ability to forgive people and give them second chances.”
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