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SEN. BOB MENENDEZ (D-N.J.) has been indicted alongside his wife Nadine Menendez for accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for the senator’s influence.
The pair are accused of having “engaged in a corrupt relationship with three New Jersey associates and businessmen.” The men, who are co-defendants in the case, are identified as Wael Hana, Jose Uribe, and Fred Daibes. The counts against the senator include conspiracy to commit bribery, conspiracy to commit honest services fraud, and conspiracy to commit extortion.
Prosecutors in the Southern District of New York allege that Menendez and his wife “agreed to and did accept hundreds of thousands of dollars of bribes in exchange for using Menendez’s power and influence as a Senator to seek to protect and enrich Hana, Uribe, and Daibes and to benefit the Arab Republic of Egypt.”
The indictment alleges Menendez of having “provided sensitive U.S. Government information and [taking] other steps that secretly aided the Government of Egypt.” Hana, who is originally from Egypt, was a longtime friend of Nadine Menendez and maintains close relationships with Egyptian government officials. The pair allegedly worked together to introduce Sen. Menendez, who chairs the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, to Egyptian intelligence and military officials and provided cash and other benefits in exchange for information “with respect to foreign military sales and foreign military financing.”
In one instance, Nadine Menendez forwarded a text message to Hana from the senator confirming that he would sign off on a $99 million dollar arms sales deal with Egypt. “👍” Hana replied.
Hours after the news broke, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced in a statement that Menendez “has rightly decided to step down temporarily from his position as Chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee until the matter has been resolved.”
Schumer added that “Bob Menendez has been a dedicated public servant and is always fighting hard for the people of New Jersey. He has a right to due process and a fair trial.”
Menendez is also alleged to have wielded his influence to interfere in a criminal case against Uribe and his associates, and of attempting to recommend the appointment of a U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey who could be influenced into helping him disrupt a criminal case against Daibes.A search by federal agents of the Menendez’s home and safe deposit box found “Over $480,000 in cash—much of it stuffed into envelopes and hidden in clothing, closets, and a safe—was discovered in the home, along with over $70,000 in Nadine Menendez’s safe deposit box.” Some of the cash was found stuffed into jackets bearing Sen. Menendez’s name and the Senate seal. They additionally found a Mercedes-Benz convertible “worth more than $60,000,” and expensive furniture paid for by Hana, Uribe, and Daibes, as well as “over one hundred thousand dollars’ worth of gold bars in the home.” A search of Menendez’s electronics found that the day after being picked up from the airport by a driver contracted by Daibes, the senator searched the phrase “how much is one kilo of gold worth.”
Menendez bashed the federal prosecutors who indicted him in a statement released Friday.
“The excesses of these prosecutors is apparent,” he wrote. “They have misrepresented the normal work of a Congressional office. On top of that, not content with making false claims against me, they have attacked my wife for the longstanding friendships she had before she and I even met. Those behind this campaign simply cannot accept that a first-generation Latino American from humble beginnings could rise to be a U.S. Senator and serve with honor and distinction. Even worse, they see me as an obstacle in the way of their broader political goals.”
Menendez added that he has been “falsely accused” and that he “remain[s] focused on continuing this important work and will not be distracted by baseless allegations.”
This is not the first time Menendez has found himself as a defendant in an alleged corruption scheme. In 2018, the Justice Department dropped a case against Menendez after a hung jury failed to convict him on charges related to his relationship with his friend and major donor Salomon Melgen. The Senate Ethics Committee issued a scathing rebuke against the New Jersey senator in the aftermath of the case. In their final report, the committee found that “over a six-year period you knowingly and repeatedly accepted gifts of significant value from Dr. Melgen without obtaining required Committee approval, and that you failed to publicly disclose certain gifts as required by Senate rule and federal law….this conduct violated Senate Rules, federal law, and applicable standards of conduct.”
In 2006, Republicans accused Menendez of violating ethics rules by collecting hundreds of thousands in rental payments from the government-funded non-profit North Hudson Community Action Corp.
New York prosecutors are expected to give a press conference Friday further detailing the latest charges against Menendez.
