Innocent until proven guilty, and their responsibility to reserve judgement until they see evidence, and due process has spoken. That’s the line. Neither in support or against, until it plays out. In the eyes of voters it’s equally likely to be political as it is to be real; the safest bet is a position of non-position and let it work itself out.

“even at the risk of compromising their own moral standing”
We elected Donald Trump (a disgusting woman hater with no character) and Joe Biden (who has enriched himself at the public trough for 50 years). Americans have long since given up looking to our politicians as moral exemplars.
Why will Santos stick around? 218 baby! I know that sounds cynical, but it really is all that matters. It’s the same reason the US Senate retains Feinstein and Fetterman despite both being obviously incapable of doing the job: 51 seats.

Joe Biden refuses to resign. Even though the House Oversight Committee has found credible evidence that Hunter Biden set up a series of shell companies to launder $10 million in foreign funds from the Chinese Communist Party and a corrupt Romanian oligarch. Despite irrefutable bank records showing deposits from foreigners ending up in 9 different Bidens’ personal accounts, Joe Biden still proclaims his innocence and claims his son did nothing wrong. The potential compromise of national security has been covered up by the FBI and CIA. Legacy news media has refused to cover the story for years.

Tell me Santos is more important than a totally corrupt president and his family. Tell me that the Santos arrest wasn’t timed to distract coverage from Joe Biden’s corruption.

I’m not seeing much in the way of reluctance. For the Republicans, he is an embarrassment. For the Democrats he is a punching bag.

They are almost certainly going to nominate a sex offender and insurrection inciter as Presidential candidate so really Santos is small beer.
It’s poss some Republicans may ‘displace’ the moral stink from that onto Santos to assuage some guilt.