Sen. Bob Menendez from New Jersey is facing a slew of new allegations amid his controversial Qatar foreign agent case, where he is accused of taking part in a years-long corruption scheme.
Federal prosecutors allege that the Democratic lawmaker accepted race car tickets and other gifts from Qatar. The accusations make the Gulf nation the second foreign country that the New Jersey official has supposedly helped while he was in office.
Bob Mendez Faces New Charges
On Tuesday, a superseding indictment against Menendez was made public where prosecutors also allege that the senator's bribery and extortion scheme continued into 2023. This was a year longer than they had initially claimed.
The new allegations include that the New Jersey senator accepted payments from one of his co-conspirators, New Jersey real estate developer Fred Daibes. This was in exchange for using his influence to help the latter obtain millions of dollars from an investment fund tied to Qatar. Furthermore, prosecutors claim that Menendez took steps to help the foreign nation.
Menendez, his wife, Nadine Menendez, Daibes, and two other New Jersey businessmen were all indicted as part of a bribery scheme last year. As per CNN, all of the individuals in the case have pleaded not guilty to the charges filed against them.
On top of the bribery charges, the senator is facing accusations of acting as a foreign agent for the government of Egypt. He allegedly took steps to help the country in exchange for one of the defendants obtaining a monopoly on a Halal export business.
The latest indictment charges against Menendez allege that he introduced Daibes to a member of the Qatari royal family and principal of the Qatari Investment Company. While the Qatari investment fund was weighing an investment, the senator made multiple public statements supporting the government of Qatar.
Prosecutors claim that Menendez provided Daibes with statements so the latter could share them with the Qatari Investor and a Qatari government official associated with the Qatari Investment Company.
Years-Long Corruption Scheme
According to the New York Times, the new indictment against the 70-year-old senator broadens the United States government's allegations that he used his position as the head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to convey benefits to foreign governments.
Menendez allegedly tried to repay tens of thousands of dollars' worth of bribes in December 2022 that had come in the form of payments for a home mortgage and toward a Mercedes-Benz convertible. The senator and his wife allegedly created documentation describing the original bribes as loans they were repaying.
On the other hand, Daibes had been planning to construct a major high-rise residential project at 115 River Road in Edgewater, New Jersey. However, that particular project lost its financing after getting bogged down in a delayed environmental cleanup.
The developments come after a federal judge in New York last year rejected Menendez's attempt to delay his criminal trial until July. The Democrat had sought a two-month delay to account for what his lawyers described as voluminous evidence that needed more time to examine, said ABC News.
