Usually, it’s not good news for a political party when a prominent senator is convicted on federal corruption charges. But Bob Mendendez’s conviction on 16 felony counts today might be the best news Democrats have gotten in weeks.
The New Jersey Democrat was found guilty of charges including bribery, extortion, wire fraud, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and acting as a foreign agent. Menendez’s conviction provides Democrats with a double opportunity. First, it could allow the party to be rid of a politician who is legendarily crooked, even by Garden State standards. Second, it offers Democrats a chance to show a contrast with Republicans, who have lined up behind convicted felon Donald Trump as their nominee, by quickly moving against Menendez. Somewhere, Senator John Fetterman—Menendez’s noisiest Democratic critic—is doing a dance of joy. (It’s probably pretty awkward to behold.)
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, both Democrats, wasted little time in calling for Menendez to resign. Other Democrats are lined up behind them. Whether Menendez will yield to the pressure remains to be seen; he has taken a defiant stance before, and used Trumpy language to imply a shadowy conspiracy against him. But Congress has typically expelled members convicted of serious crimes, and Menendez’s are particularly egregious because they concern him using his powerful perch as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to assist foreign governments and enrich himself.
[David A. Graham: Bob Menendez should never have been a senator this long]
Prosecutors’ indictment was one of the true-crime must-reads of last year’s fall season. A search of Menendez’s home turned up $100,000 worth of gold bars, provided by businessmen in exchange for favors. FBI agents also found envelopes full of cash in jackets in a closet; just in case there was any doubt, the jackets had the senator’s name sewed on them. (His defense argued that keeping large amounts of cash at home was simply a part of Menendez’s Cuban cultural heritage.) Prosecutors also cited texts from Menendez’s wife, Nadine, a co-defendant, to him complaining that another defendant had reneged on a promise to pay bribes.
Things only got more lurid after the indictment. Nadine Menendez’s trial was postponed because of breast-cancer treatments, and Bob Menendez’s defense team sought to excuse him by pinning the crimes on her. During the trial, FBI agents testified about surveilling defendants including the senator at a D.C. steakhouse. His lawyers said Menendez ate there some 250 nights a year, perhaps the bleakest detail in the whole thing. During one such meal, Nadine Menendez asked attendees, “What else can the love of my life do for you?”
Incredibly, this wasn’t Menendez’s first corruption trial. He was charged in 2017, but the case fell apart after a Supreme Court decision in another case undercut prosecutors’ strategy. A jury deadlocked, and the Justice Department decided not to retry the case. Menendez appears to have almost immediately begun engaging in the crimes for which he was convicted today.
[Read: Political accountability isn’t dead yet]
His presence in the Senate has been an albatross for Democrats as they seek to attack Donald Trump for corruption and criminality. Menendez has echoed the former president’s rhetoric and claimed he’s the victim of a political witch hunt. “For years, forces behind the scenes have repeatedly attempted to silence my voice and dig my political grave,” he said in a statement when he was charged. “Those behind this campaign … see me as an obstacle in the way of their broader political goals.” The conviction of a prominent Democrat undercuts Trump’s claim of a politicized Justice Department.
The verdict should rid the country of a craven agent for hire in the Senate, all while ridding Democrats of a political liability—should. Though Menendez lost the Democratic primary for his Senate seat earlier this year to Representative Andy Kim, he has filed to run as an independent. If he follows through, that could draw votes from Kim in November. Menendez will also likely appeal the decision, and his best hope is a federal court system, and particularly a Supreme Court, that has systematically weakened anti-corruption laws and let off crooked politicians in recent years. For the time being, however, it’s still illegal for a senator to take gold bars and stacks of cash in exchange for influencing U.S. government policy.
