Bob Menendez, New Jersey’s senior U.S. senator, was found guilty in a Manhattan federal courtroom Tuesday of all 16 counts brought against him in a wide-ranging corruption scheme.
Prosecutors argued that Menendez traded on his vast influence, did favors for Egypt’s government and tried to help rich friends wiggle out of criminal investigations in exchange for lavish bribes — including gold bars, a Mercedes-Benz convertible and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash.
The monthslong trial and verdict are historic: Menendez is the first sitting senator ever charged with or convicted of acting as an agent for a foreign government. His charges included bribery, honest services fraud and obstruction of justice. Now, the 70-year-old senator could potentially spend the rest of his life in prison.
As of 1 p.m, the jury was still reading out the verdicts for two businessmen also charged in the schemes.
The verdict also marks the fall of one of New Jersey’s most powerful political figures. Menendez ascended the ranks of Hudson County’s Democratic Party machine, first serving on Union City’s school board at age 20 in 1974. He then went on to become the city’s mayor and subsequently served in the state Legislature and Congress. His nearly 20-year Senate career has included two stints as chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations — an influential position prosecutors say he abused to send sensitive information to Egypt and expedite the approvals of hundreds of millions of dollars in aid and military equipment sales.
He stepped down from his chairmanship of the Foreign Relations Committee following his indictment last year, but refused to leave the Senate, insisting he’d be exonerated. If his Senate colleagues oust him, he’d be the first U.S. Senator expelled since 1861 and 1862, when 14 were expelled for supporting the Confederate rebellion. Menendez hasn’t previously said if he’d resign if convicted.
If Menendez leaves office, Gov. Phil Murphy would have the option of choosing a replacement to serve the remainder of the senator’s term, which ends after this year. The Senate is currently split between 51 Democrats and 49 Republicans.
Also accused in the schemes and on trial with Menendez were Fred Daibes and Wael Hana, two of the three businessmen who prosecutors say bribed Menendez and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, in exchange for political favors. Daibes was charged with seven counts, including bribery and obstruction of justice. Hana was charged with six counts, including bribery and conspiracy for a public official to act as a foreign agent.
A third businessman implicated in the scheme, Joseph Uribe, accepted a plea deal and cooperated with prosecutors. Nadine Menendez will be tried separately after she requested a delay to undergo cancer treatments.
This is Menendez’s second corruption trial. In 2015, he fought charges in state court that he had traded political favors for donations and other perks from a West Palm Beach eye doctor, but a jury couldn’t reach a verdict in that trial. The charges that Menendez was found guilty of on Tuesday were brought by prosecutors for the U.S. Southern District of New York and alleged in part that Menendez sought to abuse his influence over state investigators and the U.S. attorney’s office in New Jersey.
At trial, prosecutors laid out text messages, emails, call records and receipts they said showed how Nadine Menendez acted as an intermediary for the senator and the three businessmen. They said Menendez leveraged his position to approve or remove holds on military equipment sales and financing to Egypt. In one instance, prosecutors described Menendez ghost-writing a letter from Egyptian officials to the U.S. government seeking the release of $300 million in military aid, which was being withheld over human rights concerns — passing the letter to the Egyptian government by way of his wife and Hana.
The government also accused Menendez of helping Hana secure a lucrative monopoly on certifying halal meat exports to Egypt, and said he tried to intervene in criminal probes connected to both Daibes and Uribe.
Prosecutors said he introduced Daibes to a member of the Qatari royal family to help Daibes secure a $95 million investment deal, in exchange for bribes including race car tickets and a luxury watch. The indictment says Menendez made “multiple public statements supporting the government of Qatar” because of the corrupt arrangements.
Uribe, a star witness for the prosecution, described how he bought the Mercedes for the Menendezes in exchange for help with two criminal investigations connected to his trucking and insurance companies. He said at trial that Menendez told him in Spanish “I saved your little a–– not once but twice.”
An FBI agent who led a raid of the Menendezes’ home testified about finding gold bars as well as hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash in shopping bags, a duffel bag, a safe, two pairs of boots, and in the pockets of four jackets belonging to the senator.
Throughout the trial and in public statements, Menendez maintained he only hoarded so much cash in his home because his family faced illegal confiscations in Cuba. And his attorneys argued Nadine Menendez hid her own financial troubles from her husband, and didn’t tell him she was accepting expensive gifts and money from rich friends.
Defense attorneys also said the senator acted as a dogged advocate for constituents including those friends, but never did so corruptly. They repeatedly sought to undermine prosecution arguments that the gifts and political favors were directly tied in quid pro quo agreements.
Menendez weathered the 2015 trial with strong political support from New Jersey’s most powerful Democrats. But nearly immediately after his indictment in the current bribery case, prominent Democrats including Gov. Phil Murphy called for his resignation. Even his staunchest allies in the Hudson County Democratic Organization ultimately declined to endorse him for re-election, and Sen. Cory Booker said Menendez should step down.
Menendez sat out the Democratic primary for Senate, which was ultimately won by Rep. Andy Kim. But he has filed to run for re-election as an independent. He’s previously said he hoped to pursue his candidacy after an exoneration in court. An April poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University showed Menendez with just about 6% of the vote, but suggested he could eat into Kim’s lead over Republican Curtis Bashaw.
This is a developing story and will be updated.