Video shows drag-denier George Santos dressed in drag, boasting about drag shows
Video has emerged showing lying Long Island Rep. George Santos boasting about performing as a drag queen in Rio de Janeiro — despite his claims Thursday morning that he had never done any such thing.
The video shows Santos, clad in a black dress and sunglasses, speaking in Portuguese to an interviewer at the Pride parade in the Rio suburb of Niteroi in 2005.
“I do presentations at 1940 in Jacarepagua, I do Cascadura, I also did Cabaret Casanova in Gloria and I did one at Le Boy,” Santos says, naming well-known drag clubs in and around the city.
Santos then lauds the parade’s organization, saying: “The event is good, well-organized. I really love it.” He adds that he wanted to ride on a float in the parade, “but it was very small and there was no room to ride on top, so I’m with the crowd.”
When interviewer Joao Fraga responds, “It’s better with the crowd,” Santos answers, “Yes, look at these lovelies here,” before grabbing the man standing beside him.
Santos’ past in the Rio drag scene was made public Wednesday by Eula Rochard, a Brazilian drag performer, and Santos’ former friend. Rochard told “The Handbasket” Substack reporter Marisa Kabas that Santos dressed as a drag queen named “Kitara” while living in Brazil in 2008.
Rochard provided a photo of her and someone she said was Santos — who at the time went by one of his pseudonyms, Anthony Devolder — dressed in drag at a Pride parade that year. The picture appears to show Santos in a sparkly red, feather-lined top with chandelier and a wig. Rochard also provided the video of Santos at the 2005 parade.
Rochard told Reuters that Santos was “poor” in 2005, but in 2008 “he came back to Niteroi with a lot of money.” Santos competed in a drag beauty pageant that year using the drag name Kitara Ravache but lost, Rochard said.
“He’s changed a lot, but he was always a liar. He was always such a dreamer,” Rochard said.
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Another person from Niteroi who asked not to be named told the wire service that Santos participated in drag queen beauty pageants and aspired to be Miss Gay Rio de Janeiro.
“The most recent obsession from the media claiming that I am a drag Queen or ‘performed’ as a drag Queen is categorically false,” Santos tweeted Thursday morning. “The media continues to make outrageous claims about my life while I am working to deliver results. I will not be distracted nor fazed by this.”
When contacted by The Post about his antics on the 2005 video, Santos responded in a text message: “Absolutely false and just another bit of nonsense from the pile-on effect I’m dealing with.”
Santos himself has made a plethora of outrageous claims, including that his grandparents escaped Nazi persecution in Europe and that 9/11 caused his mother’s death. In reality, his grandparents and his mother were in Brazil during both of those tragedies, according to immigration records.
The congressional con man also admitted to The Post that he invented nearly his entire resume on the campaign trail, including his claims that he graduated from Baruch College and NYU and worked for financial giants Chase Bank and Citigroup.
His penchant for deception has prompted calls for his resignation from Democrats and Republicans alike. Still, the GOP House Steering Committee — led by Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) — placed him on two committees this week: Small Business and Science, Space and Technology.
With reporting by Carl Campanile