Senator Bob Menendez indicted for political corruption and bribery from Egypt

 

Senator Bob Menedez. USA Today/AP.

New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez has been indicted for political corruption and bribery on behalf of Egypt. USA Today. This is the 2nd time Menendez has been charged with corruption though charges in his first case were eventually dropped. Menendez and his wife are accused of taking bribes, including money, gold, mortgage payments and a Mercedes-Benz car. 

CBS News had more information about what the purpose of the bribes were. Menendez was on the foreign relations committee and had oversite over foreign military aid, including Egypt. The bribers were able to secure the release of aid that had been held back for years with the money they bribed Menendez with. Three New Jersey businessmen, including Wael Hana, were indicted along with Menendez. Hana served as the go between for Menendez and the Egyptian government. 

My Comment:

It's utterly absurd that Bob Menendez was able to serve as a senator after the first round of corruption charges back in 2015. To be fair, those charges were eventually dropped after a jury was unable to reach a verdict. But you would think that both the Democratic Party and the voters of New Jersey would have used that to ditch him during the 2018 Senate Race. They didn't and this was the result. 

Even wore, Menendez was able to keep the large amount of power he had. There was zero reason why he should have been on the foreign policy committee after the first charges were laid against him. With accusations of corruption already being there he was in an excellent position for someone else to try and bribe and it turns out that they were able to do so. 

The bribery was pretty over the top. Menendez was given solid gold bars and a car and when he was raided by the feds his jacket was full of thousands of dollars. Given the huge amount of money he took you get the feeling that Menendez was greedy even by the standards of a corrupt politicians. 

Egypt deserves quite a bit of criticism for what they did here. They corrupted (an already corrupt) Senator to get deals for their foreign policy. Sanctions and other problems were removed for them, not to mention they were enriching their agent, Wael Hana. You can argue that those sanctions shouldn't have been there in the first place, and Egypt was free to argue that, but they bribed a senator instead. 

I have little doubt that Menendez is guilty. He's been known as a crook for a long time and it would make obvious sense that he did something similar again. He also would not have good explanations on how he was able to get these thousands of dollars and gold bars. These charges are serious and I would not be surprised if Menendez tries to cut a deal to avoid a long stay in prison. 

I do think that this time Menendez will no longer have a career. These accusations are pretty rock solid and it's to the point where even Democrats are calling for him to resign. It is really saying something that they stood by him during the last go around but this time they are kicking him out. I am guessing he won't be a senator for much longer. 

All that being said, I don't think Menendez and his behavior are unique among our Senators and members of Congress. He was just the one that got caught, probably because he was very sloppy about it. One does wonder how so many of these elected officials come into office being fairly poor but end up millionaires when they finally retire. 

I also think that this is an effort by our criminal justice system to try and reassure people that they aren't totally in the bag of the Democratic Party. They want to be able to say that they don't only persecute Republicans like Donald Trump and the January 6th political prisoners. It won't work, because those cases are either extremely flimsy (like the Trump case) or massively overcharged (the January 6th cases). Menendez, on the other hand, seems like a sacrifice by the powers that be, with the additional benefit of him being guilty as sin.