Good morning. It’s Monday. Today we’ll look at the bribery trial of Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey as it enters its fourth week in Federal District Court in Manhattan.
As former President Donald Trump’s motorcade drove in recent weeks to Manhattan’s criminal courthouse for his hush-money trial, it passed a federal courthouse down the block where a trial is underway of another political figure — Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey.
With the Trump verdict in, let’s catch up on Menendez’s trial, which began on May 13 and could last another month or so.
Menendez, 70, and his wife, Nadine Menendez, 57, were charged last year with conspiring to accept gold, cash, a Mercedes-Benz and other bribes collectively worth hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for the senator’s willingness to meddle in criminal prosecutions in New Jersey and to steer aid and weapons to Egypt. A federal indictment says the conspiracy dates to before the couple were married in 2020, and it depicts Nadine Menendez as a kind of go-between among conspirators.
“What else can the love of my life do for you?” she asked during dinner at a Washington steakhouse in one of the meetings she arranged for her husband and Egyptian officials, the indictment says.
The trial comes as Menendez, a Democrat and former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, nears the end of his third full term in the Senate. He has consistently maintained his innocence, has said that he will be exonerated and has left open the possibility of running for re-election as an independent. He, his wife and two New Jersey businessmen charged with him — Wael Hana and Fred Daibes — have all pleaded not guilty.
Highlights of the trial have included:
Menendez’s ‘blame my wife’ legal strategy: The senator’s lawyers have put blame squarely on Nadine Menendez. “She kept him in the dark on what she was asking others to give her,” one of the senator’s lawyers told the jury. “She tried to get cash and assets any which way she could.”
The strategy could carry risks, legal experts told The New York Times. “One worries that the jury will say you’ve committed two crimes — you’ve taken bribes and you’ve blamed your spouse,” one expert said.
Nadine Menendez was to be tried with her husband, but the judge, Sidney Stein, postponed her trial until at least July because she is being treated for breast cancer.
Gold, gold and more gold: During the trial’s first week, a prosecutor handed a juror a plastic bag containing an object that glinted under the courtroom lights: a gold bar. One by one, jurors took turns holding the bag. The prosecutor then handed over another bag, which contained several gold bars.
Gold has been at the center of the government’s case against the Menendezes. An F.B.I. agent testified that a June 2022 search of the couple’s home in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., turned up 11 one-ounce gold bars and two one-kilogram gold bars, as well as $486,461 in cash.
The gold and cash were among the “fruits” of the alleged bribery scheme, the indictment says.
Testimony about a brief exchange between the senator and a U.S. official: Ted McKinney, a former official at the U.S. Agriculture Department, testified on Friday that he received a curt phone call from Menendez in May 2019 with a clear message: “Stop interfering with my constituent.”
McKinney said he had been raising questions about a decision by Egypt directly benefiting a New Jersey startup firm run by Hana, a co-defendant and longtime friend of Nadine Menendez. Despite Hana’s having no experience in the area, Egypt had granted him a monopoly on the business of certifying that halal meat sent from the U.S. to Egypt had been prepared according to Islamic law.
The decision, McKinney told the jury, was causing the price of halal products to rise in Egypt and was hurting U.S. ranchers, farmers and beef processors. But McKinney said he had no success in trying to explain that to the senator. “I felt he was telling me to stand down,” McKinney testified.
Prosecutors say Hana’s firm was used to funnel bribes to the senator and his wife.
Fast talkers: The trial has not lacked for tension as the parties have clash over evidence and legal issues. But another problem has surfaced in court that for years has been endemic among New Yorkers: They talk very fast.
Indeed, Judge Stein has gently reminded the lawyers and witnesses to speak less quickly, noting he was getting “looks of screaming eyes” from the court’s interpreters and stenographers.
At one point, Judge Stein addressed a prosecutor: “Let me ask a personal question. Did you happen to grow up in New York, sir?”
“I did,” the prosecutor replied.
“Well, you speak very quickly,” Judge Stein said. He added, “All New Yorkers speak too fast.”
The judge, who is from New Jersey, asked the prosecutor to try to slow down a bit.
The trial resumes on Monday.
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METROPOLITAN diary
Downtown Manhattan
Dear Diary:
My first job in Manhattan was downtown. The building, on Rector Street, dated to the early 20th century. I had to use my entire body to pry open the heavy brass door. My father could do it with one arm.
A building employee greeted us with a broad smile every day. He wore dark pants, a dark tie, dark shoes, dark socks and a white shirt. We always said hello.
The lobby was narrow and dark. The floor was marble. The ceilings were high. The walls were unadorned. If we looked at the lights, we saw spots. The sound of the click-click-click of my father’s shoes echoed through the lobby.
We tapped an elevator button to go up. The buttons were off-white with the letters U or D in black. We stood quietly as we waited to go up to the 12th floor.
My father and I worked in different departments. When we reached our floor, he turned one way, and I turned the other.
Every morning at 10:30, our work was interrupted by the ring of a bell. It was the signal that the woman with the coffee cart had arrived. She wore a black waitress uniform with a white hat, white apron and white gloves.
We filed into the hallway to buy a cup of tea or a Danish wrapped in plastic or a package of peanut butter crackers.
— Betsy Petrick
