Pro-Armenian senator's political future ends US prosecutors VS Menendez

Federal prosecutors have asked a judge to allow the corruption case against Sen. Bob Menendez to proceed.

They were arguing that when he pressured officials to further the alleged scheme, he stepped outside of constitutional protections granted to members of Congress. Menendez last month asked the judge overseeing his corruption case to dismiss charges of bribery and acting as a foreign agent, arguing he was shielded from prosecution by the US Constitution’s speech and debate clause, Caliber.Az reports citing New Jersey Monitor.

In a new filing entered on February 5, federal authorities say Menendez’s alleged violations lay outside of those protections and argue the case against him should continue.

“Even if these claims rested on full and correct statements of the law — and they do not — they could only result in dismissal if the Court were to disregard the Indictment’s allegations, construe them in the defendants’ favor, or look beyond the Indictment to supposed, contestable, and contested facts,” the prosecutors said.

Prosecutors allege Menendez accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gold bars, a Mercedes Benz, and payments to a consulting firm launched by his wife Nadine Menendez.

In his motion to dismiss, the senator argues he cannot face charges because his alleged actions — including calls to prosecutors or urgings that federal agencies intervene in negotiations between Egypt, Sudan, and Ethiopia, among others — were not “official acts” under the definition set in McDonnell v. United States, the 2016 opinion.

But prosecutors dismiss Menendez’s argument as irrelevant because bribery charges do not require the bribe taker to hold up their end of an illicit bargain, only that they agree to do so.

“It does not matter whether the defendants are correct — and they are not — as to whether one or more of the actions that Menendez actually took was an ‘official act,’ because the Indictment also alleges that Menendez promised or agreed to take official acts. No more is required,” the government’s filing says.

“Taking a bribe is, obviously, no part of the legislative process or function; it is not a legislative act,” prosecutors wrote, quoting a 1972 US Supreme Court opinion in US v. Brewster.

“None is a cognizable basis for a defendant to avoid a jury trial. And none can or should be considered by this Court,” according to New Jersey Globe.

Menendez has also argued that the case against him should be severed from that against his wife, who is accused of being heavily involved in the senator’s alleged bribery scheme, so as to avoid forcing him to incriminate her. Again, prosecutors said that his argument should be rejected.

“The defendants are charged with entering into and executing a scheme together, the Indictment makes plain how they worked together, and they should be tried together,” they wrote.

Menendez’s additional requests to have the charges thrown out for improperly applying to multiple different acts, or to move the case out of the Southern District of New York, were also opposed by prosecutors in February 6 filing.

Menendez’s trial is currently set to begin on May 6, after his effort to have it delayed until the summer was rejected by U.S. District Court Judge Sidney Stein.

Regardless of the legal outcome, though, Menendez’s political future is likely over thanks to the charges against him. If he tries to seek another term in the Senate this year, he’s expected to get virtually no party support anywhere in New Jersey, and dozens of his colleagues in the Senate have called for his resignation.