Introduction
Sound: “How do you deal with somebody who is an out-and-out liar? Lie after lie after lie. George Santos is a fraud. George, I’m speaking to you. It’s time to step down.”
Jonathan: What has leaders of the Republican Party calling on one of their own members of Congress to resign?
We’ve got the story. Plus… are we on the verge of a space race… to Mars?
Those stories and more today on… Notice News.
George Santos Under Fire
Jonathan: Hey guys it’s Jonathan here at Notice HQ in Brooklyn and I hope you had a great long weekend. For the past several weeks, this congressman from Long Island, New York – not that far from where we are – has been under fire for lying extensively about his background. Our Washington correspondent Angie has the story.
Angie: What do you think would happen to you if you got a job and then got caught lying about where you went to high school, where you went to college, where you worked before, your religion, even your athletic ability?
Well, that’s exactly what this Congressman did… 34-year-old Republican George Santos, who was just elected in November to represent New York’s third congressional district.
Sound: “His lies were not mere fibs. He disgraced the House of Representatives, in particular, his fabrications went too far.”
That’s the head Republican in Santos’ own county last week calling on Santos to resign. Over the past couple of weeks, he’s been caught lying about going to a prestigious New York City high school, graduating college and getting a masters degree, working at two high-powered wall street firms, and even lying about being the grandson of – wait for it – holocaust survivors.
Santos admits he quote “embellished” his resume, but others claim it goes further than that.
Sound: “He’s basically confessed. And he needs help. This is not a normal person.”
So far though, Santos has refused to resign, and leading national Republicans have stopped short of asking him to step down too. Remember, Republicans hold just a five seat majority in the House and Santos’ resignation would trigger a special election.
That election could put another seat in play and potentially cut into Republicans’ razor-thin majority.
Headlines
Jonathan: Here’s what else is making news right now.
At least 70 people are dead after a plane crash in the South Asian country of Nepal over the weekend. It’s unclear what caused the crash but the black boxes from the plane have been recovered.
More classified documents were found at President Biden’s home in Delaware over the weekend, months after other documents were found in his former office. The president says he doesn’t know how the documents got there, but he’ll cooperate with the investigation.
And the sci-fi sequel Avatar: The Way of Water was the number 1 movie in the world for the 5th week in a row last week. It’s made almost 2 billion dollars so far, making it the 7th highest grossing movie of all time. it will likely pass, #6, Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Space Race – to Mars?
Jonathan: You may have heard about NASA’s Artemis project, a set of rockets and missions that America’s space agency says will take us back to the moon – and, eventually – Mars.
NASA hopes to land Americans on the red planet by the early 2040s – but we’re not the only ones with that goal. On the other side of the world, China has also significantly amped up its own space efforts.
They landed their first rover on Mars in 2021, and plan to have their own astronauts there by 2033, years before the United States. The U.S. meanwhile has been enlisting the help of its allies to boost its Mars plans.
Just last week, NASA welcomed the prime minister of Japan, which has signed on to help with the mission – along with Canada, the U.K., and South Korea – 23 countries in total.
All this has experts wondering, are we in the middle of another space race?
The first space race was between the U.S. and communist Russia in the 1950s and 60s.
It started when Russia launched the first ever satellite – Sputnik – in 1956, and ended when Americans landed on the moon – 13 years later – with Apollo 11.
Since then, no country’s been back. Getting to Mars, however, is much more difficult. It’s 250 times further from earth than the moon.
Conclusion
That’s it for today but you can learn more about NASA – and China’s – plans to reach Mars on our website, NoticeNews.com.
Maeve will be back tomorrow with more from us, Notice News.