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US Democrat Bob Menendez has been found guilty on 16 charges in a sprawling bribery scheme to benefit a foreign country
A US senator has for the first time been found guilty of bribery and acting as an agent of a foreign government.
US Democrat Bob Menendez, who championed stringent sanctions on Russia while he was chair of the highly influential Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has been sentenced to 11 years in prison on bribery and corruption charges.
He was found guilty last July of accepting cash and gold bars and acting as an illegal agent for the Egyptian government, and resigned from the Senate a month later.
“The public cannot be led to the belief that you can get away with bribery, fraud, and betrayal,” US District Judge Sidney Stein said on Wednesday. “I don’t know what led you to this,” Stein added. “You’ll have to try to figure that out yourself over time.”
Prosecutors had sought at least 15 years in prison, along with millions of dollars in forfeitures and fines, arguing that such penalties were necessary “to provide just punishment for this extraordinary abuse of power and betrayal of public trust.”
“For someone who spent his entire life in public service, every day I’m awake is a punishment,” the former lawmaker told the court.
Menendez began his political career in 1974 when he was elected to the Union City Board of Education. He later served as the city’s mayor from 1986 to 1992, then moved to the state legislature in 1988 and the state senate in 1991. He represented New Jersey’s 13th district in the US House of Representatives from 1993 to 2006, when he was appointed to the Senate.
After the initial charges were filed in September 2023, Menendez stepped down from his position as head of the Senate’s influential Foreign Relations Committee, where he had played a key role in drawing up Washington’s sanctions on Moscow even before the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022.
His attorney, Adam Fee, argued that the former senator’s nearly 50 years of public service should not be overshadowed by his conviction, dismissing the public’s characterization of him as “Gold Bar Bob.” The defense team also requested that Menendez remain out of prison while they appeal his conviction.
