The Federal Election Commission sent a letter this week to New York Congressman George Santos’ fundraising committee requesting clarification on certain donors.

In the letter the commission flagged contributions accepted by Santos’ political committee, which received three $25,000 contributions from Matthew Bruderman, Jeff Vacirca and Todd O’Connell and an additional $1,000 from Bruderman.

Under the Federal Election Campaign Act, contributions are subject to limits. In 2021 the FEC announced updated contribution limits that were effective for federal elections in 2021-2022.

During the two-year midterms election cycle the limit for contributions by individuals to federal candidates for president, the U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of Representatives is $2,900 per election. Because the primary and general count as separate elections, individuals may give $5,800 per candidate per cycle.

“If any contribution you received exceeds the limits, you may have to refund the excessive amount,” Sarah Vivian, a senior campaign finance and reviewing analyst at the FEC said in an emailed statement.

CNN noted that letter informed Santos that the information listed for three of his listed donors — “Best Efforts/Best Efforts,” “NYCBS/MD” and “NYCBS/Self Employed” — is “not acceptable” and that his campaign “must provide the missing information.” If the campaign cannot provide the information, the FEC said it must provide evidence, in detail, of its best efforts to obtain the information.

Last week, CNN reported on records that Santos’ campaign filed with the FEC, which showed dozens of expenses just below the commission’s threshold to keep receipts.

Those expenditures “definitely stood out to me,” campaign finance expert Paul S. Ryan, the deputy executive director of the Funders’ Committee for Civic Participation told the news network.

“My view is a bunch of expenditures right below legal requirement for the committee to keep receipts is evidence that he knew what he was doing,” Ryan said. “If in fact he did misuse campaign funds, this was a blatant effort to evade detection.”

Reacting to the CNN reporting Santos’ lawyer, Joe Murray, said the “suggestion that the Santos campaign engaged in any unlawful spending of campaign funds is irresponsible, at best.”

This latest episode in the saga of the congressman adds to the ongoing probes by media outlets and investigation by federal prosecutors with the U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Anne Donnelly, the Republican district attorney for Nassau County, and the office of New York State Attorney General Letitia James had previously announced investigations into Santos based on the recent revelations over his lies, misrepresentations, and questionable finances from multiple media outlets in New York looking into his background.

The 34-year-old Santos had admitted that he deceived voters in New York’s 3rd Congressional District regarding his work history and education. His arrival in Washington to take up his congressional seat and be sworn in as part of the incoming 118th Congress has been met with calls for him to set aside including New York’s other openly gay congressman, Democrat Ritchie Torres, to urge the House Ethics Committee to probe the Republican’s fundraising on the campaign trail, saying the “complete fabrication” of his background could signal other issues. 

“George Santos admits his life story is a complete fabrication. His pitiful confession should not distract us from concerns about possible criminality and corruption. The Ethics Committee MUST investigate how he made his money. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire,” Torres said. 

Upon learning of the recent FEC letter, in an email to the Washington Blade, Torres said:

“George Santos is a habitual liar who knowingly misrepresented every facet of his personal and professional life in order to reach elected office.

It is a disgrace that he is even allowed to step foot on the House floor, participate in the votes for speaker, and possibly be sworn in as a new member of Congress. I hope the FEC inquiry, along with the other pending investigations surrounding Mr. Santos, are just the beginning of the massive but necessary untangling of his web of deception. Perhaps then we will all learn what the people of New York deserve — and what he seems to know nothing about — the truth.”

Torres also took aim at Santos sitting next to anti-LGBTQ Georgia Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene in a sarcastic tweet eviscerating Santos for his false claim that his grandparents had escaped the Holocaust and that he had Jewish heritage which he later backed off.

“I never claimed to be Jewish,” Santos told the New York Post. “I said I was ‘Jew-ish.’”

Greene had suggested in a Facebook post in 2021 that wildfires in California were not natural. She claimed that the blazes had been started by California utility company PG&E, in conjunction with a prominent European Jewish banking family using a space laser.

Majorie Taylor Greene to George Santos:

“I never said Jewish space lasers. I meant Jew-ish space lasers.” pic.twitter.com/zlx0llyRKg

— Ritchie Torres (@RitchieTorres) January 6, 2023

Santos, like the other 434 representatives of the House, had been unable to be sworn-in as members of his GOP party have squabbled over making California Congressman Kevin McCarthy the next speaker. Santos backed McCarthy, which is why some political pundits believe explains the GOP leader’s silence on him and his lies and grifting as the California Republican literally needed every vote he can get to become speaker.