Free Republic

The Department of Justice is investigating whether expensive gifts were given to New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez and his wife, including a Mercedes-Benz, a luxury D.C. apartment, money and jewelry, sources familiar with the matter said. According to sources, investigators want to know if the gifts — which would be valued in the tens of thousands of dollars — came from the owner or associates of an Edgewater, N.J., business that won a controversial exclusive contract to perform Halal meat certification with the Egyptian government — even though U.S. Department of Agriculture officials complained that the firm had no previous...

Democrat Sen. Bob Menendez (NJ) held a meeting in his Washington, DC, office in 2018 with a New Jersey businessman who is at the center of a federal corruption probe into the senator, the Wall Street Journal reported. Southern District of New York prosecutors are investigating Menendez as part of a corruption probe, which reportedly stems from facts similar to a 2015 U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) case against Menendez and Democrat donor Salomon Melgen for conspiracy and bribery. According to the Wall Street Journal: The meeting, which hasn’t been previously reported, came months before the businessman, Wael Hana, secured...

Lawyers for Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) are expected to meet with federal prosecutors in the coming weeks as the Justice Department nears a decision on whether to charge the powerful lawmaker after a years-long corruption probe. The expected discussions between the 69-year-old’s legal team and prosecutors from the Manhattan US Attorney’s Office will provide Menendez an opportunity to make the case for why he shouldn’t be indicted, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. It’s unclear what potential counts could be leveled against the Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman or whether his wife, 56-year-old Nadine Arslanian, has been implicated in...