#Nadine Menendez

[dontmeantobepoliticalbut]

It’s gotten buried a bit underneath news about the negotiations over a cease-fire in Gaza, the related protests on U.S. college campuses, and the ongoing trial of a former president for allegedly covering up payments to a pornography actress, but high-profile Democratic Texas Rep. Henry Cuellar was indicted on Friday by the Department of Justice in Houston. He says he is not guilty of the charges and will stand for reelection as planned this fall.

Cuellar, a relatively conservative Democrat who represents a district that stretches along the U.S.–Mexico border around Laredo and pokes up to San Antonio, is charged with 14 counts of conspiracy, wire fraud, and so forth related to allegations that he was paid under the table to influence U.S. policy on behalf of Azerbaijan’s national oil company, SOCAR, and the Mexican bank Banco Azteca. (Neither Banco Azteca nor SOCAR, nor any of their employees, have been charged with a crime.)

A longtime incumbent, Cuellar won his general-election race in 2022 by a wide margin. But his district, the 28th, has a significant population of Hispanic and/or Latino voters and has become more Republican in recent years as those groups have trended rightward. The Cook Political Report rates it as having a Democratic “lean” of 3 points—which, roughly speaking, means a generic Democrat would be expected to beat a generic Republican in the district by only a 3-point margin. That’s close enough to mean that Cuellar’s indictment and potential conviction could threaten Dems’ efforts to retake the House of Representatives, which Republicans currently hold by a tenuous four votes.

The case is similar to that of Democratic New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, another longtime incumbent who was indicted last September for allegedly accepting bribes from three men in New Jersey who were seeking to influence U.S. policy toward Egypt, among other things. Menendez’s trial is set to begin next week, and he says that if he is not convicted he still might run for reelection in November as an independent. While he’d be very unlikely to win such a race, he could potentially siphon enough votes away from the Democrats’ presumptive nominee, current Rep. Andy Kim, to throw the seat to Republicans.

So, both of these members of Congress are in high-stakes races that they are refusing to drop out of despite facing corruption indictments. But there’s another major similarity between the two stories as well: Wives!

Menendez’s wife Nadine was also charged in his case, and the allegations against the couple include claims that the men accused of seeking favors from the senator bought Nadine Menendez a Mercedes convertible and paid her to hold a fake no-show “job” at a halal-certification business. Cuellar’s wife Imelda was also indicted; she’s accused of receiving the alleged bribe payments from SOCAR and Banco Azteca through shell companies she owned that were ostensibly providing the firms with “consulting” services. The government alleges that, actually, Imelda Cuellar did “little to no legitimate work” in return for the hundreds of thousands of dollars she was paid.

A statement issued by Cuellar says his wife is innocent. Nadine Menendez has pleaded not guilty, although in a disclosure that may have caused some awkwardness around the proverbial Englewood Cliffs dinner table, Robert Mendendez’s attorneys told a judge in January that his potential testimony at trial might implicate her. Since then, however, the pair’s cases have been separated from each other in a way that will preclude anything he says from being used against his spouse.

Does the Democratic Party have an (alleged) Bribery Wife Guy problem? Are liberals soft on wife crime? This fall, the voters will have their say.

[abovetopsecretxxl]

✌Robert Menendez Server Motion - Original Document✌

https://berndpulch.org/2024/01/16/%e2%9c%8crobert-menendez-server-motion-original-document%e2%9c%8c/

[tomorrowusa]

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) needs to resign ASAP. He has been associated with scandals in the past though there had usually been a plausible (if thin) element of deniability. This latest scandal is different. If this were fiction, people might call it laughably unreal.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and other top Garden State Democrats are calling on Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez to resign – a sign of how quickly the senator’s political support may erode after Friday’s shocking indictment on federal bribery charges. “The alleged facts are so serious that they compromise the ability of Senator Menendez to effectively represent the people of our state,” Murphy, a Democrat, said in a statement. [ ... ] Menendez and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, are accused of accepting “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes,” including gold, cash and a luxury vehicle in exchange for the senator’s influence.

Seriously, gold bars?

U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez of NJ indicted a 2nd time on corruption charges

The indictment alleges real estate developer Fred Daibes; Wael Hana, who owns a halal meat certification business in New Jersey; and businessman Jose Uribe collectively provided hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for Menendez’s “acts and breaches of duty to benefit the Government of Egypt, Hana, and others, including with respect to foreign military sales and foreign military financing.” It also says Menendez provided sensitive information to the Egyptian government. Menendez, a Democrat, leads the Senate’s Foreign Relations Committee and is a longtime member of New Jersey’s congressional delegation. The indictment comes almost six years after Menendez was tried on corruption charges related to a Florida eye surgeon, which ended in a mistrial. [ ... ]

The indictment says Menendez took bribes that included “cash, gold, payments toward a home mortgage, compensation for a low-or-no-showjob, a luxury vehicle, and other things of value.” Prosecutors also say he interfered with the state attorney general’s office’s investigation into Jose Uribe, a former insurance agent convicted of fraud. The indictment describes Uribe as a business associate of Hana’s.

Some of Bob's gold...

If Menendez were to resign, Gov. Phil Murphy (a Democrat) would appoint a replacement to serve until the next election in 2024. As it turns out, Menendez is up for re-election next year. If he foolishly refused to quit and decided to run again, he'd probably get trounced in the primary.

The Senate can expel a member, but there have been only 30 attempts to do so since the adoption of our current constitution. Only half of those were actually expelled – the last one in 1862.

Damian Williams is the US Attorney for the Southern District of New York. He opened the investigation of Menendez last year and secured the three-count indictment against the senator. Williams is a Democrat appointed by President Joe Biden. So the Menendez indictment makes it more difficult for Trump and his followers to claim that the two federal indictments against him in Florida and DC are a partisan "witch hunt" targeting him.

[reality-detective]

Sen. Bob Menendez and his wife, Nadine, indicted on bribery charges

Demonrats from New Jersey. 👇

He dismissed the allegations against him in a statement, saying; Prosecutors have “misrepresented the normal work of a Congressional office.”

Is that article misrepresenting? Is this the normal work of a congressional office? Why is his wife involved? What other normal work do the spouses of a congressional office do? 🤔

[beardedmrbean]

Several gold bars discovered by federal agents in Democratic New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez's residence as part of a high-profile bribery investigation can be traced to a violent robbery a decade ago.

According to a sprawling indictment unsealed by federal prosecutors in September, Menendez and his wife allegedly played a role in a years-long bribery scheme that involved the Egyptian government and local businessmen including Fred Daibes, a wealthy New Jersey real estate developer. Prosecutors revealed they retrieved multiple gold bars from Menendez's home which were allegedly used as payment in the scheme.

At least four of the gold bars discovered by investigators can be linked to Daibes, both because of their unique engraved serial numbers and thanks to court documents related to a 2013 robbery which Daibes was a victim of, an NBC New York investigation revealed Monday. In November 2013, four assailants beat and robbed Daibes at gunpoint in his Edgewater, New Jersey, apartment, stealing 22 gold bars, jewelry and cash.

"Each gold bar has its own serial number," Daibes told local investigators in a 2014 transcript obtained by NBC New York. "They’re all stamped … you’ll never see two stamped the same way."

5 EXPLOSIVE REVELATIONS FROM DEM SEN BOB MENENDEZ'S BOMBSHELL FEDERAL INDICTMENT

Photographs released by the Department of Justice in September showing the gold bars discovered at Menendez's home, for example, reveal one of the bars has a serial number of "590005." Daibes reported a gold bar with that same serial number stolen during the 2013 heist, NBC New York reported.

And the federal indictment notes that the serial numbers on the gold bars indicate they had previously been possessed by Daibes.

MSNBC'S ALICIA MENENDEZ ADDRESSES FATHER'S INDICTMENT: COLLEAGUES HAVE 'AGGRESSIVELY' COVERED

"A court-authorized search of the residence of Robert Menendez and Nadine Menendez, a/k/a ‘Nadine Arslanian,’ the defendants, revealed, among other things, approximately two one-kilogram gold bars and nine one-ounce gold bars that had serial numbers indicating they had previously been possessed by Fred Daibes, the defendant," the indictment states.

In addition, when Daibes reported the robbery to police in 2013, he said 22 gold bars had been taken. Similarly, the September indictment states that Daibes sold 22 gold bars to Wael Hana, another defendant allegedly implicated in the bribery scheme.

Police ultimately arrested and charged four individuals for robbing Daibes in 2013, according to local media reports. Then, in September 2015, the suspects all pled guilty and were ultimately sentenced to several months in prison.

Meanwhile, since the federal bribery indictment was unsealed earlier this year, Menendez has repeatedly asserted his innocence and remained in the Senate.

"The allegations leveled against me are just that, allegations," Menendez said Sept. 25. "For anyone who has known me throughout my 50 years of public service, they know I have always fought for what is right. My advocacy has always been grounded. And what I learned from growing up as the son of Cuban refugees, especially my mom, my hero, Evangelina Menendez. Everything I accomplished, I worked for despite the nay sayers and everyone who has underestimated me.

"I firmly believe that when all the facts are presented, not only will I be exonerated, but I still will be New Jersey’s senior senator," he added.  "The court of public opinion is no substitute for our revered justice system. We cannot set aside the presumption of innocence for political expediency when the harm is irrevocable."

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇲 US Senator Bob Menendez, D-NJ and his wife Nadine have been Indicted on Felony Bribery Charges

US Prosecutors revealed on Friday US Senator Robert Menendez (69), D-NJ and his wife Nadine have been Indicted on Federal Felony charges of Conspiracy to Commit Bribery, Conspiracy to Commit Honest Services Fraud, and Conspiracy to Commit Extortion Under Color of Official Right.

The indictment alleges New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez and his wife accepted bribes including cash, gold bars, payments on a home mortgage, compensation for a no-show job (guess his last name isn't Biden), luxury vehicles and other forms of payment.

Prosecutors say they executed a Search Warrant of Senator Menendez and his wife's home in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey back in June, 2022. While searching the couple's home, Prosecutors say they found more than $480'000 cash, most of it stuffed away in envelopes, hidden in clothing, closets, and a safe. The indictment also alleges cash was found in the Senator's closet in jackets with his name embroidered on it, as well as $70'000 cash in a safe deposit box owned by the Senator's wife.

Also discovered during the execution of the Search Warrant was a Mercedes Benz convertible valued at over $60'000, given to Senator Menendez's wife by two New Jersey Businessmen, Wael Hana and Jose Uribe, allegedly in return for the Senator's interference in a criminal case involving an associate of the businessmen.

Also found by Federal Agents were gold bars valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars also given by the businessman Hana and another associate, Fred Daibes. All three businessmen were also charged by Federal Prosecutors.

Senator Bob Menendez is also accused of having "provided sensitive US Government information and took other steps that secretly aided the Government of Egypt."

Another accusation in the indictment includes pressuring a US Department of Agriculture official for the purpose of protecting a business monopoly granted by Egypt to the businessman Wael Hana.

The indictment also alleges Senator Menendez "promised to and did use his influence and power and breach his official duty to recommend that the President nominate an individual for US Attorney for the District of New Jersey who Menendez believed" he could influence.

The charges against Senator Menendez and his wife were announced by Damien Williams, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York at a news conference on Friday.

Previously, Senator Menendez faced indictment in 2015 for allegedly accepting favors from an influential Florida eye doctor, but the case was dismissed after the jury split and was unable to reach a verdict.

Today's new charges filed against Senator Menendez and his wife were the culmination of a year-long Corruption investigation led by US Attorney Damien Williams for Southern District of New York.

[progressivepower]

N.J. Attorney General Opens Inquiry Into Nadine Menendez’s Fatal Crash http://dlvr.it/Sx5XLc

[follow-up-news]

Sen. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., was hit Tuesday with charges alleging that he and his wife conspired to obstruct justice in the bribery case against them. The superseding indictment against Menendez and his wife, Nadine, brings the total amount of federal charges facing the once-powerful head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to 18. The new indictment comes just days after one of Menendez’s co-defendants in the case, New Jersey businessman Jose Uribe, pleaded guilty and agreed to cooperate with the probe. The document cites a meeting Nadine Menendez had with Uribe in 2022 after federal investigators had issued subpoenas seeking information about payments he'd made on a luxury car for her, which prosecutors said was part of the bribery scheme. She asked Uribe what he'd tell investigators and he said he'd tell them it was a loan, the filing says. She told him that "sounded good," according to the indictment. The indictment said the senator first had his lawyer tell investigators that he was unaware of the car payments or mortgage payments from another businessman that prosecutors said was also part of the bribery scheme. He later had his attorney tell investigators he'd found out they had been loans, the indictment said, when he "well knew" that they "were not loans, but bribe payments." In a statement Tuesday, the senator called the new charges "a flagrant abuse of power."

[1americanconservative]

https://x.com/CollinRugg/status/1705313152999858205?s=20

FLASHBACK: While Democrat Senator Bob Menendez was slandering Trump in 2019 for being a "Russian agent", he himself was working on behalf of Egypt's government. They are always doing what they accuse others of... In February of 2019, Menendez expressed his concerns about then-President Trump being "compromised" by Russia on the Senate floor. "I’m talking about the entirely legitimate question of whether Donald Trump could be compromised by the Russian government," he said at the time. During this same time, Menendez was allegedly working on behalf of Egypt's government. Meetings were arranged in 2018 between Menendez 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." (Reuters) Menendez' wife, Nadine was then put on payroll for a business belonging to Egypt born businessman Wael Hana. "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 from the United States to Egypt," Reuters reported. "Menendez later sought to persuade the U.S. Department of Agriculture to not take any action to interfere with the company's monopoly status."

[southjerseyweb]

Will Rob Menendez ever escape the shadow of his dad, Senator Bob ... - South China Morning Post

The senior Menendez and his wife Nadine have been charged with benefiting Egypt and using his position to 'meddle' in criminal cases in New Jersey …

[novumtimes]

New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez’s corruption trial begins. Here’s what to know.

Washington — For the second time in his career, New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez is heading to trial on corruption charges. This time, he’s fighting allegations that he traded his political influence for cash, gold bars and a new Mercedes-Benz convertible.  The allegations date back to 2018, around the time the Democratic senator began dating the woman who is now his wife, Nadine Menendez, who was…

[beardedmrbean]

What to Know

For the second time in a decade, Sen. Bob Menendez is finding his political career and freedom on the line in a federal criminal case that already has forced him out of one of the Senate's most powerful posts

Prosecutors say he and his wife accepted gold bars, cash and a luxury car as bribes to aid three businessmen in his home state and that the favors influenced his interactions with Egypt and Qatar

Menendez's lawyers, though, say he stayed within the rules and did nothing illegal

Sen Bob Menendez, a Democrat, went on trial in Manhattan federal court Monday, accused of accepting bribes of gold and cash to use his influence to deliver favors that would help three New Jersey businessmen.

Menendez, 70, sat with his lawyers and listened as Judge Sidney H. Stein told several dozen prospective jurors about the charges against Menendez and two of the businessmen.

The judge told them the “sitting U.S. senator from the state of New Jersey” had been charged in a conspiracy in which he allegedly “agreed to accept bribes and accepted bribes.”

After he warned them that the trial was expected to last up to seven weeks, Stein let jurors raise their hands if they believed they could not serve for that length of time. Then, he took them one at a time into a separate room to ask them why.

Menendez, wearing a suit with a red tie, was dropped off in front of a Manhattan federal courthouse at 8:15 a.m., forty minutes before former President Donald Trump's motorcade passed by on its way across the street to state court, where he is on trial for allegedly falsifying business records to hide hush money payments to a porn actor before the 2016 election.

He did not speak to reporters who were kept behind barricades as he entered a security pavilion where everyone entering the courthouse is scanned.

Menendez is on trial with two of the businessmen who allegedly paid him bribes — real estate developer Fred Daibes and Wael Hana. All three have pleaded not guilty. A third businessman has pleaded guilty and agreed to testify against the other defendants. The senator's wife is also charged, but her trial is delayed until at least July.

Opening statements were possible, but unlikely, before Tuesday for a trial that has already sent the senator's political stature tumbling. After charges were announced in September, he was forced out of his powerful post as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

The three-term senator has announced he will not be seeking reelection on the Democratic ticket this fall, although he has not ruled out running as an independent.

It is the second corruption trial for Menendez in the last decade. The previous prosecution on unrelated charges ended with a deadlocked jury in 2017.

In the new case, prosecutors say the senator's efforts on behalf of the businessmen led him to take actions benefitting the governments of Egypt and Qatar. Menendez has vigorously denied doing anything unusual in his dealings with foreign officials.

Besides charges including bribery, extortion, fraud and obstruction of justice, Menendez also is charged with acting as a foreign agent of Egypt.

Among evidence his lawyers will have to explain are gold bars worth over $100,000 and more than $486,000 in cash found in a raid two years ago on his New Jersey home, including money stuffed in the pockets of clothing in closets.

The Democrat's wife, Nadine Menendez, was also charged in the case, but her trial has been postponed for health reasons. She is still expected to be a major figure. Prosecutors say Nadine Menendez often served as a conduit between the men paying the bribes and Menendez.

The senator's lawyers in court papers have said they plan to explain that Menendez had no knowledge of some of what occurred because she kept him in the dark.

According to an indictment, Daibes delivered gold bars and cash to Menendez and his wife to get the senator's help with a multimillion-dollar deal with a Qatari investment fund, prompting Menendez to act in ways favorable to Qatar's government.

The indictment also said Menendez did things benefitting Egyptian officials in exchange for bribes from Hana as the businessman secured a valuable deal with the Egyptian government to certify that imported meat met Islamic dietary requirements.

In pleading guilty several weeks ago, businessman Jose Uribe admitted buying Menendez's wife a Mercedes-Benz to get the senator's help to influence criminal investigations involving his business associates.

[workersolidarity]

🇺🇲🇪🇬 NEW JERSEY SENATOR BOB MENENDEZ CHARGED WITH ACTING AS A FOREIGN AGENT FOR EGYPT

Embattled New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez was slapped with new superseding charges Thursday, accusing the longtime corrupt politician of acting as a Foreign Agent and accepting bribes from the government of Egypt.

The new indictment was handed down by a Federal Grand Jury in Manhattan. The charges carry a sentence of up to two years in prison for failing to register as a public official acting as an agent for a foreign power.

The indictment accuses the Senator of providing "sensitive US Government information and took other steps that secretly aided the Government of Egypt."

Just weeks ago, Senator Menendez and his wife Nadine pled not-guilty to corruption charges alleging he took bribes worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, including hundreds of thousands of dollars in gold bars found in his home in New Jersey.

The new charges say Menendez acted as an "agent of foreign principle" on behalf of the Government of Egypt from January 2018 to June 2022.

The new charges make no new allegations about accepting any additional cash or services than that already cited in the previous indictment.

Further, the new indictment alleges Menendez used his position to send two letters to the Justice Department in May 2022, including one to Attorney General Merrick Garland, requesting an unnamed former member of Congress be investigated for acting as a Foreign Agent.

As Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Menendez was responsible for overseeing billions of dollars in US Aid to Egypt.

The charges stemming from last month's indictment included allegations of conspiracy to commit bribery, conspiracy to commit honest service fraud, and conspiracy to commit extortion under color of official right.

Those charges accuse the senator of accepting “cash, gold bars, payments toward a home mortgage, compensation for a low-or-no-show job, a luxury vehicle and other items of value."

In addition to the current indictments and the new one announced today, the FBI is also investigating whether Egyptian Intelligence services were involved with Menendez's corruption.

So far, the New Jersey Senator has refuted all charges and refuses to step down from Congress.

#source

@WorkerSolidarityNews