Disabled Navy veteran Rich Osthoff on Wednesday spoke out about his allegations that Rep. George Santos (R-NY) ripped off the $3,000 GoFundMe he had set up to pay for cancer surgery for Osthoff's service dog in an interview with CNN's Erin Burnett on Wednesday.
Osthoff, who was homeless at the time, described how Santos raised the money to help the dog and then slowly started ghosting him, in part demanding he use a veterinarian on Long Island where he was — and forcing Osthoff to pay for transportation and tolls to get there, with false promises of reimbursing him.
Also in the interview was Michael Boll, President of the New Jersey Veterans Network, who tried to help Osthoff get the money he was owed.
"I called up Rich, and said this shouldn't be a problem. It's probably a misunderstanding at best. Relax, let me just speak to him and we'll work it out," said Boll. "When I called him, my intentions were just to settle this really quickly and move on. But the problem was is that when I spoke to him on the phone, he was not listening to what I was saying. He already made up his mind. I said to him, can you please give the money back to the people, or there's a veterinarian in Rich's area that we can give the money to and put it into, like a fund where he could use it from time to time. It's not your money to keep. And he just wasn't hearing it."
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"I called Rich back horrified," said Boll. "I was really upset because this is Rich's lifeline. I work with veterans every day. And dogs save people's lives. And he needed this dog every day to be in his life. And I felt horrible to tell him that I failed him because of feeling that [Santos] at the time, was going to do the right thing and he did not."
Osthoff also opened up about what his dog Sapphire, who died a few months after Santos cut off all contact with the two, meant to him.
"That dog saved my life at least two times," said Osthoff. "When I first got out of the service I was depressed, I was having nightmares, bad, bad memories about some things that happened. Not war-related but other things that the military does to you. I started drinking too much. I was doing reckless stuff. My father even told me he thought I had a death wish at that point. And I probably did. I was very suicidal. I would start crying for no reason. If I didn't have that little princess with me, I probably would've not been here to speak to you right now, at least two times. I would think about her, and I said nobody else is going to be her daddy. That's my dog. And I'd cuddle with her and I'd snuggle up with her and all the bad stuff went away."
Watch the video below or at this link.
Rich Osthoff recounts how George Santos scammed himwww.youtube.com
