US Senator Menendez charged with bribery, says he will not resign
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[September 26, 2023]
By Luc Cohen, Patricia Zengerle and Andrew Goudsward
NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. prosecutors on Friday charged
powerful Senator Bob Menendez and his wife with taking bribes from three
New Jersey businessmen, which could complicate Democrats' efforts to
keep their slim majority in the U.S. Senate in next year's elections.
Menendez later stepped down temporarily from his role as chairman of the
Senate's Foreign Relations Committee until the case is resolved, Senate
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement, adding that Menendez
had a right to due process.
The U.S. Attorney's office in Manhattan said Menendez, 69, accepted
hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of cash and gold bars in exchange
for using his power and influence as New Jersey's senior senator to
benefit the government of Egypt and interfere with law enforcement
probes into the businessmen.
Menendez has been an important ally to fellow Democrat Joe Biden as the
president has sought to reassert U.S. influence on the world stage,
rally support for congressional aid to Ukraine, and push back against a
rising China.
New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, a Democrat, as well as several other
Democratic state officials and members of the U.S. House of
Representatives, called on Menendez to resign from the Senate.
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"The alleged facts are so serious that they compromise the ability of
Senator Menendez to effectively represent the people of our state,"
Murphy - who would appoint a temporary replacement for Menendez should
he go - said in a statement.
However, Menendez said he had no plan to resign.
"It is not lost on me how quickly some are rushing to judge a Latino and
push him out of his seat. I am not going anywhere," he said in a
statement late Friday.
Prosecutors are seeking to have Menendez forfeit assets including his
New Jersey home, a 2019 Mercedes-Benz convertible, and about $566,000 in
cash, gold bars and funds from a bank account.
The indictment contained an image of gold bars investigators seized from
Menendez's home as well as envelopes stuffed with cash found inside
jackets bearing Menendez's name hanging in his closet. Prosecutors said
they found more than $480,000 in cash in his home.
Damian Williams, the top federal prosecutor in Manhattan, noted that
Menendez's website says that as a senator he cannot compel an agency to
act in someone's favor or influence matters involving a private
business.
"Behind the scenes, Senator Menendez was doing those things for certain
people - the people that were bribing him and his wife," Williams said.
He added the investigation was ongoing.
Menendez said in a statement that prosecutors mischaracterized routine
legislative work.
"The excesses of these prosecutors is apparent," Menendez said. "The
facts are not as presented."
A lawyer for Nadine Menendez, 56, who has been married to the senator
since 2020, said she denied wrongdoing and would "vigorously defend"
against the allegations in court.
MENENDEZ HAS FACED OTHER PROBES
The investigation marks the third time Menendez has been investigated by
federal prosecutors, although he has never been convicted.
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Federal prosecutors in New Jersey dropped a case in January 2018 in
which Menendez was charged with accepting private flights, campaign
contributions and other bribes from a wealthy patron in exchange for
official favors. A 2017 trial on those charges ended in a jury deadlock.
He was also investigated in 2006.
Senate Democratic rules require any member charged with a felony to give
up their leadership position, although they can resume it if found not
guilty. Senator Ben Cardin is expected to step in again as foreign
relations chairman, as he did after Menendez was indicted in 2015.
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![](../images/092623PIX/news_g74.jpg)
U.S. Senator Robert Menendez (D-NJ) walks to the Senate floor for a
procedural vote at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, U.S. September
20, 2023. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Sep/26/images/ads/current/businessdirectory_dailycover_2023.png)
Menendez, on his third term, has said he plans to seek re-election
next year.
An investigation could complicate Democrats' effort to expand their
slim 51-49 seat majority in the 100-member Senate, although New
Jersey has not elected a Republican to the Senate since 1972.
A Cuban American, Menendez has been the toughest opponent among
Biden's Democrats of any move by the administration to soften
policies toward Cuba and Venezuela.
He has also been one of the Senate's most vocal critics of Saudi
Arabia and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, especially resistant to
major weapons deals for the kingdom.
Criminal charges against members of the 100-seat Senate are
relatively rare. Ted Stevens, a former Republican Senator from
Alaska, was found guilty of corruption in 2008, but the conviction
was later overturned due to prosecutorial misconduct. Larry Craig, a
Republican from Idaho, was arrested for lewd conduct in a bathroom
in 2007 and pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of disorderly conduct.
BUSINESSMEN ALSO CHARGED
Menendez, his wife and the businessmen - Wael Hana, Jose Uribe, and
Fred Daibes - are all expected to appear in Manhattan federal court
on Sept. 27 to face charges of conspiracy to commit bribery and
conspiracy to commit honest services fraud.
Bob and Nadine Menendez also each face one count of conspiracy to
commit extortion under color of official right. The pair each face
up to 45 years in prison, though any sentence would ultimately be
determined by a judge and would likely be much shorter.
According to the indictment, Hana - who is originally from Egypt -
arranged meetings in 2018 between the senator and Egyptian
officials, in which officials pressed Menendez to sign off on
military aid Washington had withheld over concerns about the
country's human rights record.
![](http://archives.lincolndailynews.com/2023/Sep/26/images/ads/current/siu_sda_090723.png)
In exchange, Hana, 40, put Nadine Menendez on the payroll of a
company he controlled that had the exclusive right to certify halal
meat shipped to Egypt from the United States, prosecutors said.
The senator later sought to persuade the U.S. Department of
Agriculture to not take any action to interfere with the company's
monopoly status, according to the indictment.
"We are still reviewing the charges but based upon our initial
review, they have absolutely no merit," a spokesperson for Hana said
in a statement.
The Egyptian embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a
request for comment.
Prosecutors said Uribe, who worked in the trucking and insurance
businesses, gave Nadine Menendez $15,000 in cash to help pay for a
Mercedes-Benz convertible after her husband asked an official at the
New Jersey attorney general's office to resolve fraud investigations
into Uribe's associates favorably.
Daibes, a real estate developer, gave Menendez gold bars and cash
after Menendez sought to influence a federal criminal case in New
Jersey against Daibes for obtaining loans under false pretenses,
federal prosecutors in Manhattan said. Daibes pleaded guilty and
received a probationary sentence.
Lawyers for Uribe and Daibes did not immediately respond to requests
for comment.
(Reporting by Luc Cohen and Jonathan Stempel in New York and
Patricia Zengerle in Washington; Additional reporting by Matt
Spetalnick, Simon Lewis, Makini Brice and Andrew Goudsward in
Washington; Writing by Tom Hals; Editing by Mark Porter, Daniel
Wallis and Rosalba O'Brien)
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