George Santos' Queens office director has hands full trying to get job done

Yet another caller was on the phone Friday afternoon with something to say about embattled Rep. George Santos.

She didn't seem to be a fan.

The receptionist, seated inside Santos’ storefront district office on Northern Boulevard in Douglaston, Queens, listened for 28 seconds before informing her Santos wouldn't do what a recent poll says 78% of voters in his 3rd Congressional District want him to do.

“Well, I can tell you he has no plans to resign, ma’am, and I appreciate your call. All right? You have a nice day. Buh-bye,” he told the woman, one of the 40 to 50 callers that Santos’ district director estimates the office gets most days.

The freshman Republican is under a cloud of unflattering revelations and probes over his questionable financial dealings, fundraising practices and lies about nearly every facet of his life. He’s been accused of scams and grifting and being a fabulist. The allegations keep coming.

Meanwhile, business at the Douglaston office goes on, albeit with a barrage of constituents and others calling up to let Santos’ office know exactly what they think. The House of Representatives is adjourned until Feb. 27, so Santos is ostensibly in the district.

“People want to call, and they can say if they want him to resign, we’ll make sure he knows. But people will call and say, ‘Tell him to keep going!’” the man in charge, district director Mark Woolley, said after leading a reporter through the path of the church graveyard next to Santos’ office for an interview.

Woolley, age 66, says the office has already helped expedite passports for constituents with imminent trips abroad, followed up on years-pending immigration matters and fielded inquiries from would-be cadets who will ultimately need a recommendation — from Santos or another official — to gain admission to a military academy like West Point.

There’s also the duty of judging a student art competition in which the winners get their work displayed in Congress. And with tax season ramping up, Woolley said, he expects more calls about the Internal Revenue Service and refunds.

“Everything else aside, not supportive or condoning anything, or saying one way or the other, it’s a congressional office. Every congressional office in the United States has a member, and that office should be respected, 'cause it’s a congressional office, and it should have someone in there who can oversee everything, make sure the constituents are getting the services they deserve, and that their issues are being addressed,” said Woolley, wearing a baseball cap and holding a bottle of Dr Pepper.

Veteran of GOP politics

Woolley, a former local newspaper reporter, is no stranger to Republican politics. 

Most recently, he was district director to then-Rep. Lee Zeldin of Shirley, who, like Santos, is an ally of Donald Trump, another politician who drew regular protests.

In 2017, Woolley was the man who intercepted anti-Trump protesters in a stairwell of Zeldin's office off Main Street in Riverhead to tell them they needed an appointment, then asked them to leave. 

In the 1990s, Woolley worked for another congressman, Rick Lazio of Brightwaters, who would later unsuccessfully challenge Hillary Clinton’s bid for the U.S. Senate, and also for Michael Forbes of Quogue, the congressman who defected from the Republicans to the Democrats. Woolley, with other staffers, resigned.

After Zeldin left office at the end of 2022 following a bid for governor, Woolley was considering retirement — but the Santos situation changed his mind.

“I saw how things were going here, as far as the office,” Woolley said, and “watching everything unfold, maybe I wasn’t ready to hang it up, so to speak.”

Woolley started Jan. 25; he had first connected with Santos' team the weekend before.

His initial few weeks haven't been easy.

No elected officials have said they’ll work with Santos’ office, Woolley said (although he said a local mayor in the district is willing to meet; Woolley declined to give more details), and dozens of local officials — including 30 fellow Republicans on Long Island — have outright refused to do so.

And there’s the constant callers, petitioners and frequent pickets demanding Santos’ resignation. (NYPD barricades, apparently ready to be deployed in the event of picketing, are kept bundled on the sidewalk in front of the office.)

Before Woolley started the job, a cubicle wall partition had been placed in front of the window because onlookers, including a regular gaggle of reporters and cameras, were a perpetual presence.

“It was making it tough for staff to get work done. You had peering in and yelling,” he said.

Instead, Woolley had an American flag hung up to block the view into the office, where four staffers work. Soon it will be five, he said.

Trying to get the job done

Woolley sometimes hears about Santos on the radio news on the commute in from Woolley's Suffolk County home and when he goes to bed at night.

So what does Woolley think about the Santos controversy?

“I’m not judge and jury. Whatever it is, it will play itself out, and if I were to sit around and ponder about all that, I wouldn’t have been here, and I wouldn't be getting my job done,” Woolley said.

On Monday, Santos came into the district office for the first time at least since Woolley has been on the job, he said.

Constituents and local government officials should consider giving the office a chance, despite the controversy, he said.

“If you’re willing to leave it outside the door, and you’re willing to go ahead and come in and talk and trust in the fact that you’ve got congressional staff here, and in D.C., working for you in the district, then you’ll be in good hands,” he said.

Voters of every party and every demographic know who Santos is, are following the news about him and view him unfavorably, according to the poll, released Jan. 31 by Newsday/Siena College.

Does Santos' troubled reputation get in the way when his office has to deal with government bureaucrats on routine business?

The reporter raised the topic with Woolley in the graveyard interview. He paused, and sought help standing up from the step he’d been sitting on. (He’s got an arthritic right knee, he explained; as a younger man, he’d played defense in soccer.) He looked downward.

“How best to answer that? Hmmm,” he said. He paused again. “I’ll get back to you on that.”

By Matthew Chayes

matthew.chayes@newsday.comchayesmatthew

Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.