September 22, 2023 - Sen. Bob Menendez indicted on federal bribery charges

Federal prosecutors in the bribery case of New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez said the investigation is "very much ongoing" and called on the public and additional witnesses to come forward.

The official said that his office remains "firmly committed to rooting out public corruption without fear or favor and without any regard to partisan politics."

More on the case: Menendez was charged on Friday with corruption-related offenses for the second time in 10 years. He and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, are accused of accepting “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes” in exchange for the senator’s influence, according to the newly unsealed federal indictment.

Prosecutors allege the bribes included gold, cash, home mortgage payments, compensation for a “low-or-no-show job” and a luxury vehicle.

CNN's Kara Scannell and Katelyn Polantz contributed reporting to this post.

After laying out the indictment charges against Sen. Bob Menendez, Damian Williams, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, detailed why these were offenses.

"Constituent service is part of any legislator's job. Sen. Menendez is no different. And as explained in the indictment, there are things that Sen. Menendez says he can do for his constituents and things that he says he cannot do. He put it all on his Senate website," Williams said.

Sen. Bob Menendez and his wife, according to prosecutors, received a range of lucrative bribes, including cash and gold bars as well as car and mortgage payments.

In 2019, according to court documents, Hana paid $23,000 to bring Nadine Arslanian Menendez’s mortgage payments current, allowing her to avoid foreclosure proceedings.

Hana and Uribe also allegedly helped Nadine Menendez buy a new Mercedes-Benz convertible if Sen. Menendez interfered in a New Jersey state prosecution – which, according to the indictment, he did.

Nadine Menendez allegedly thanked Uribe, who funded monthly payments for the car, over text message, writing: “You are a miracle worker who makes dreams come true I will always remember that.”

After federal authorities searched the Menendez home, Nadine Menendez wrote Uribe a check for $21,000 with a memo line reading “personal loan,” prosecutors say.

Around June 2019, Nadine Menendez also set up an entity in New Jersey called Strategic International Business Consultants, LLC so that she and her husband could receive bribe payments, prosecutors allege. Those payments included at least three $10,000 checks.

In 2021, Hana allegedly used money from his Halal meat company to order the Menendez’s “two exercise machines and an air purifier, among other items, collectively worth thousands of dollars,” according to court documents. 

After a meeting that same year between Sen. Menendez and an Egyptian official, Hana allegedly purchased 22 one-ounce gold bars each worth around $1,800. Investigators later found two of those gold bars when they searched Menendez’s house.

By early 2022, the Menendez’ had received additional payments from Hana including “hundreds of thousands of dollars in checks, cash, and gold.”

US Attorney Damian Williams is holding a news conference now on the indictment against New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez.

Menendez and his wife, Nadine Arslanian Menendez, are accused of accepting “hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes” in exchange for the senator’s influence, according to the newly unsealed federal indictment.

Prosecutors allege the bribes included gold, cash, home mortgage payments, compensation for “low-or-no-show job” and a luxury vehicle.

Also charged are Will Hana, Jose Uribe and Fred Daibes.

Sen. Bob Menendez and his wife accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars to use the senator’s position to benefit the government of Egypt, including providing sensitive US government information and secretly helping to steer military aid to Egypt, according to the federal indictment.

“Those bribes included cash, gold, payments toward a home mortgage, compensation for a low-or-no-show job, a luxury vehicle, and other things of value,” the indictment says.

According to the indictment, Menendez’s wife, Nadine – along with a friend and now co-defendant – introduced the senator to Egyptian intelligence and military officials. 

Menendez, as ranking member and then-Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had substantial influence over military contracts and aid, including to Egypt, who the indictment says was among the largest recipients of US military aid over the last several years.  

Over dinners and meetings with Egyptian officials, Menendez and his then-girlfriend and future wife promised to use his political power to facilitate US military sales and financing to Egypt in exchange for his wife to be placed on the payroll of one of the co-defendant's companies for a “low-or-no-show job,” the indictment says. 

After one of these meetings, according to the indictment, Menendez asked the US State Department for highly sensitive information about how many people were serving at the US embassy in Egypt as well as their nationalities. 

Menendez later texted the breakdown of who was employed at the embassy to his then-girlfriend, who forwarded it to a co-defendant who sent the sensitive information to an Egyptian official.

The senator is also accused of disclosing non-public information about military aid to Egypt to individuals who passed the information onto Egyptian officials. Menendez also helped draft a letter on behalf of the government of Egypt “seeking to convince other U.S. Senators to release a hold on $300 million in aid to Egypt.”

After being provided briefing materials passed along from the Egyptian government for requests for military financing and sales to the country, Menendez told his wife to pass along a message that he would “sign off this sale to Egypt today,” the indictment says.  

Menendez said the sale, totaling at least $99 million, included target practice rounds and 10,000 rounds of tank ammunition. 

“NOTE: These tank rounds are for tanks they have had for many years. They are using these in the Sinai for the counter-terrorism campaign,” he allegedly messaged. 

The message eventually made their way to an Egyptian official, who responded with a “thumbs up” emoji.

Searches of Sen. Bob Menendez's home and safe deposit box that federal agents conducted in 2022 turned up nearly $500,000 in cash, including in envelopes inside jackets emblazoned with Menendez's name.

Photos of piles of cash laying on top of a navy and a black jacket are included in the indictment.

Prosecutors say some of the envelopments had the fingerprints or DNA of one of the business contacts from whom Menendez is accused of taking bribes.

The federal investigators who searched Menendez's home also found a "luxury vehicle paid for by [Jose] Uribe parked in the garage," as well as home furnishings from other business contacts and gold bars.

New Jersey Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez is facing three federal conspiracy charges:

According to the Justice Department's case, Menendez and others also worked together to commit fraud and that he and his wife agreed to extortion of his office.

The conspiracy counts also charge his wife Nadine Arslanian Menendez, and three people described as New Jersey associates and businessmen, Wael Hana, Jose Uribe and Fred Daibes. 

The group is accused of coordinating to use Menendez's power as a US senator to benefit them personally and to benefit Egypt.

In the newly unsealed federal indictment against Sen. Bob Menendez, prosecutors accuse the Democrat of trying to sway the president's choice of the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey to benefit one of the business associates, and to pressure the US Department of Agriculture to protect a business monopoly another contact had from Egypt.

The allegations form a core part of what prosecutors say was Menendez's attempts to use his office as a US senator for the benefit of his business contacts.

The Department of Agriculture in 2019 had contacted Egypt to object to it giving Menendez's contact, Wael Hana, monopoly rights related to supplying halal meat to the US.

Yet Hana met Menendez in his office along with others, including an Egyptian intelligence official, in May 2019, asking for help fending off the US agency's opposition. The group went to a Washington, DC, steakhouse for dinner that evening, the indictment said.

Two days later, Menendez allegedly called an Agriculture Department official, asking them to stop opposing Hana's venture.

Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin told CNN that the charges against her Democratic colleague, Sen. Bob Menendez, are “serious accusations.”

“They’re serious accusations, but I’ll wait to learn more,” said Baldwin.

Pressed if she had any plans to speak with Menendez or any of her other colleagues about the indictment, she replied, “I’m waiting to learn more. I know we’re going to hear more even today.”