Menendez was a ‘senator on the take,’ prosecutor says, while his lawyers blame his wife

NEW YORK — An attorney for Sen. Bob Menendez on Wednesday detailed how the senator had no involvement in a wide-ranging bribery scheme, but laid blame for at least some of it on his wife.

“He did not ask for bribes, he did not get any bribes,” said Menendez attorney Avi Weitzman, who repeatedly called his client “Bob” during a lengthy opening statement.

But prosecutors say they have gold, cash and a luxury car that helps them show Menendez was involved in more than politics as usual — he was about “politics for profit.”

“This case is about a public official who put greed first, who put his power up for sale,” said Lara Pomerantz, an assistant U.S. Attorney, in the federal government’s opening statement.

Menendez will face a series of daunting witnesses called by the government, including the top federal prosecutor in New Jersey and a former New Jersey state attorney general.

But Menendez’s defense team said the prosecutors will be unable to prove their case and, in an aggressive move, asked for a mistrial shortly after prosecutors made those opening statements. A judge denied that motion, but it suggests Menendez’s attorneys are teeing the trial up for an appeal already. Several major public corruption cases have been overturned on appeal in recent years — by legal teams that include one of the senator’s attorneys in this case.

As expected, the senator plans to point the finger at his wife, Nadine Menendez, for having financial dealings that the senator was not aware of. She is also charged in the alleged bribery scheme but faces a separate trial because of undisclosed health issues.

In an opening statement that ran over an hour, Menendez defense attorney Weitzman told jurors to ask themselves “Where’s Bob?” during the weekslong trial as prosecutors attempt to prove allegations that the senator put his power up for sale in a series of alleged schemes intended to aid a trio of New Jersey business people and the government of Egypt and Qatar.

Weitzman’s opening statement began like a campaign speech about the senator’s hardscrabble upbringing and career. It was interrupted several times by objections from prosecutors, several of which the judge sustained, like when Weitzman tried to introduce anecdotes about his own twin brother or his family history involving the Holocaust.

But Weitzman’s main job was to defuse the bombshell evidence prosecutors said they have. He attempted to at length, offering reasons for all the headline-grabbing accusations against Menendez.

The gold bars found at the senator’s? Those were found in Nadine’s locked closet, Weitzman said.

The envelopes of cash found in the senator’s home? The senator withdrew money because of his family history in Cuba.

A New Jersey businessperson’s fingerprints on one of those envelopes of cash? Friends touch each other’s stuff — and “this isn’t a murder weapon,” Weitzman said, “it’s an envelope.”

The senator’s calls to former New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal asking about a case for one of the businesspeople’s associates? That was Menendez looking out for Latino truckers he’d heard were being discriminated against.

A call to federal agriculture officials on behalf of a Halal meat monopoly led by an Egyptian-American businessperson also accused of bribing the senator? Constituent services.

Asking around about how the current U.S. Attorney for New Jersey would handle a case against one of the business people who is a co-defendant, New Jersey developer Fred Daibes? “Vetting,” Weitzman said, since the prosecutor, while in private practice, had worked on a lawsuit against Daibes.

Still, while Menendez’s attorney called the allegations “outrageously false,” Weitzman also noted the “government would be unable to meet its burden of proof,” suggesting the defense hopes to poke enough holes in prosecutors’ theory — in part by blaming Nadine. He described her as a well-educated, “beautiful” and tall “international woman” who the senator met some 15 years after his divorce and who “sidelined” the senator when it came to her own finances. (Unmentioned was a fiancee from the interim.)

Prosecutors cast Nadine as a conduit between the senator and New Jersey businesspeople seeking to buy his influence — running what a federal prosecutor described as a “bribe collection company.”

Sure, the senator may have made some calls for friends, Weitzman told the jurors, but favoritism wasn’t illegal. “You may not like it, but it’s not a crime,” he said.

Prosecutors, however, promised a cache of evidence. They said witnesses — who Menendez allegedly reached out to in exchange for bribes — are expected to take the stand and would tie New Jersey's senior senator to corrupt acts to benefit New Jersey businesspeople and foreign governments.

And a key witness is expected to testify: Jose Uribe, a businessperson who was named as a co-defendant in the case but who has pleaded guilty to participating in the bribery scheme. Uribe is expected to testify as he seeks a reduced sentence. Pomerantz said Uribe would provide an “inside look” to the alleged scheme.

A high-level official from the United States Department of Agriculture who was also allegedly pressured by Menendez is also expected to testify, Pomerantz said.

It is Menendez’s second corruption trial within a decade, although the allegations he faces this time are far more grave and have all but ended his political career.

In the prosecution’s opening statement of the trial Wednesday, Pomerantz described Menendez at the center of the complex bribery allegations, saying he was a “senator on the take." Co-defendants in the case are developer Daibes and Wael Hana, a businessperson with ties to the Egyptian government.

Their defense attorneys are expected to make opening statements on Thursday morning.

During the trial, which is expected to last about two months, two of the expected witnesses in the trial would be Grewal and Philip Sellinger, New Jersey’s U.S. Attorney. Prosecutors said that in exchange for bribes, Menendez tried to have the two interfere in investigations or prosecutions, although they did not succumb to the senator’s pressure, Pomerantz said.

Pomerantz promised the jury, which was seated just before lunch on Wednesday, that evidence and messages would show “hour by hour” and even “minute by minute” proof of corrupt schemes unfolding. She said Daibes texted Menendez pictures of gold bars, which were later used in bribes.

Nadine Menendez, she said, was the “go between to deliver messages to and from the people paying bribes,” but she allegedly kept Menendez apprised of the schemes. Federal prosecutors said that after Nadine Menendez received a new luxury vehicle in exchange for the senator interfering in a state investigation, she texted him “we are the proud owners of a 2019 Mercedes.”

When Menendez walked out of the courtroom, he said he thought it went well.

“My guy did great,” he said.