Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

George Santos calls man ‘human scum’ for asking question about Gaza

The embattled congressman appears to have been holding a baby before the confrontation

In a bizarre and dramatic scene on Capitol Hill, Rep. George Santos (R-N.Y.) called a man a terrorist sympathizer for asking what he was doing about the situation in Gaza.

In clips posted to social media, Santos can be seen identifying a man to a Capitol Police officer as someone who had accosted him “while I had a two-month-old baby in my hand.” Santos then approached the gentleman and addressed him, saying “you came in my personal space yelling, threatening the decorum.”

The man asked Santos, currently facing mounting legal troubles including charges of conspiracy and wire fraud, what he was doing about the Israeli army’s bombing campaign in Gaza. Santos then pointed his finger at the gentleman and insisted it was “abhorrent that you are in this building stepping up for terrorists.” Santos called the man a “terrorist sympathizer” while storming off.

The man was identified by NBC reporter Sahil Kapur as a Jewish American named Shabd Singh. Though the audio is difficult to make out, Singh appears to say that he is the descendant of survivors of the Holocaust. Santos, who the Forward found to have lied about having Holocaust survivor grandparents, fired back “I don’t care — you are human scum.”

Singh could be heard calling Santos a “coward.” Santos walked down the corridor screaming, saying “the next time he accosts me with a child in my hand, I want him out of here.”

“Nobody defending Hamas has any business in this building, whether you’re elected, whether you’re a civilian,” Santos said. “It is a disgrace that we allow people to parade that kind of thought in here.”

Singh, who did not appear to defend Hamas in the video, appears to have encountered Santos earlier, when pictures show the congressman was holding an infant.

New York Sun correspondent Matt Rice snapped a picture of Santos with the infant leaving Rep. Tim Burchett’s office. Asked if the baby was his, Santos said “not yet.”

 

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly. 

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at editorial@forward.com, subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.

Exit mobile version