WASHINGTON (CN) — New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez once again publicly refused to step aside Tuesday amid swirling accusations that he illegally acted as a foreign agent while serving as head of the upper chamber’s foreign relations committee, framing the cornucopia of federal charges against him as a political hack job.
“The United States Attorney’s Office is engaged not in a prosecution, but a persecution,” Menendez, a Democrat, said during lengthy remarks on the Senate floor. “They seek a victory, not justice.”
Federal prosecutors have in recent months piled on allegations that the New Jersey senator accepted bribes from individuals connected with the governments of Egypt and Qatar.
In the most recent indictment, unsealed last week in the Southern District of New York, Menendez, who until recently chaired the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, was accused of making public statements supporting the Qatari government to assist New Jersey real estate developer Fred Daibes, who was seeking a multimillion-dollar investment from a fund with ties to the Gulf state.
In exchange for his participation, prosecutors say, the senator received bribes in the form of cash, gold bars and luxury goods.
A separate indictment in September accused the lawmaker of similar conduct.
A superseding set of charges unsealed in October further accused him of acting as an agent of the Egyptian government by, among other things, pressuring colleagues into signing off onto an aid package for Cairo and feeding information about potential arms sales to an individual working with the Egyptian government.
Menendez, however, has maintained his innocence on all counts.
The lawmaker told his Senate colleagues on Tuesday that he had received “absolutely nothing from the government of Qatar or on behalf of the government of Qatar to promote their image or their issues,” and sought to downplay examples of pro-Qatar rhetoric from his office cited in the indictment, including a 2021 statement in which he thanked the Qatari government for helping to resettle Afghan refugees.
“I have criticized Qatar,” Menendez added, “as I have any other country when I felt they were falling short of their international obligations and applauded them when they have led in ways the United States and the world would commend.”
Menendez also accused the Justice Department of using “baseless conjecture” to tie him to bribery charges. Prosecutors provided the court with images of luxury wristwatches, gold bars and other gifts he allegedly received, Menendez argued, “but no proof of receiving any such gifts.”
During an FBI search of Menendez’s New Jersey home last year, investigators seized more than $100,000 in gold bars and $480,000 in cash, some of which was hidden in a jacket emblazoned with the Senate seal and the senator’s name. The lawmaker also conducted multiple web searches for the current price of “one kilo gold” after returning from a trim to Qatar and Egypt in 2021, the indictment said.
Meanwhile, Menendez also slammed accusations that he had acted as an unregistered foreign agent of Egypt, branding the charged “unprecedented” and “outrageous.”
The lawmaker suggested that the Justice Department was setting a dangerous precedent by taking what he called “the normal engagement of members of Congress with a foreign government and transform[ing] those engagements into a charge of being a foreign agent.”
Since the initial charges against Menendez came down, the lawmaker has faced increasing calls to resign from other members of Congress. Among the senator’s most vocal critics have been Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman and New Jersey Representative Andy Kim, who late last year announced that he would run for Menendez’s Senate seat in the 2024 election.
Menendez, however, has remained defiant. The lawmaker on Tuesday accused some of his colleagues of making a “political calculation” in urging him to step aside.
“For the administration, the political establishment and for my detractors, it would be much easier to have me exit the scene,” the New Jersey senator said, positioning himself as a bulwark in border security negotiations and arms sales to Turkey, among other issues. “But I will not step aside and allow these things to happen in the name of political expediency.”
Menendez, who said he is celebrating 50 years of public service, added that he was “suffering greatly” due to the accusations against him.
“This is not how I wanted to celebrate my golden jubilee,” he said, choking up slightly.
It’s not Menendez’s first time facing corruption charges — the lawmaker in 2015 was the subject of a similar indictment, but allegations against him were dropped in 2017 after a jury deadlocked.
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