A defiant Senator Bob Menendez pleaded not guilty Monday to a new federal charge that he acted as an agent of the Egyptian government while chairing the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The New Jersey Democrat, who was asked to stand during a brief hearing in Manhattan federal court, spoke clearly and slowly as Judge Sidney Stein asked him to plead guilty to the new charge. “Not guilty,” the veteran legislator said.
wearing a navy pinstriped suit and pink tie, during the five-minute procedure.
Menendez, 69, did not answer questions from reporters as he walked in and out of the lower Manhattan courthouse.
The veteran Democrat is accused in a rewritten version of his bribery indictment first revealed in September of conspiring with his wife and an Egyptian-born businessman to secretly work on behalf of Cairo between 2018 and 2022.
All members of Congress are prohibited from acting as agents of a foreign government.
Menendez arrived in federal court in Lower Manhattan, where he is expected to deny new charges that he acted as an agent of the Egyptian government. Stephen Yang for NY Post
Menendez has already pleaded not guilty to charges that he and his wife, Nadine, pocketed hundreds of thousands of dollars in gold bullion and other bribes in exchange for a series of alleged favors to Egyptian officials and New Jersey businessmen.
FBI agents who raided the Menendez home in Englewood Cliffs in June 2022 found wads of cash stuffed inside windbreaker jackets emblazoned with the senator’s name, more than $150,000 in gold bars and a 2019 Mercedes C-Class. which the couple allegedly bought with down. payment received as a bribe.
Menéndez has vehemently denied the accusations against him – claiming that he accumulated large sums of cash out of a habit inherited from his Cuban ancestors – and has refused to resign from the Senate.
The senator has said he kept wads of cash in his house due to a custom stemming from his Cuban heritage. Stephen Yang for NY Post
“Picking new charges on top of new charges does not make the allegations true,” he said in a statement issued after the new indictment was announced Oct. 12.
Menendez, who stepped down as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last month, has faced growing calls for him to resign from his Senate post.
The senator has yet to provide an explanation for why the fingerprints of one of the alleged bribers’ drivers were allegedly found on an envelope full of money inside his home, or why he Googled “price per kilo of gold.” shortly after receiving an alleged bribe in gold bars.
The senator’s wife, Nadine Menendez, separately pleaded not guilty to charges that she helped her husband act as an Egyptian agent. Getty Images Egyptian-born New Jersey businessman Wael Hana is accused of acting as a middleman in the alleged scheme.
Among the most alarming charges Menendez faces is that he allegedly secretly pressured his colleagues to unfreeze $300 million in military aid destined for Egypt while he headed his powerful committee.
The new indictment to which Menendez pleaded not guilty on Monday includes explosive new details about his alleged meetings with Egyptian officials during this period.
Days after a meeting in May 2019, an Egyptian intelligence agent texted alleged intermediary Wael Hana saying the senator “would sit very comfortably” if he helped calm his colleagues’ concerns about military funding. Egyptian in light of a 2015 Egyptian airstrike on a group of tourists that seriously injured an American citizen.
“Consider it done,” Hana responded, according to the indictment.
Nadine Mendendez and Hana pleaded not guilty to the new conspiracy to act as a foreign act charge in a separate hearing last week.
The senator was able to delay his hearing until Monday, citing official Senate duties he needed to attend to.
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Source: vtt.edu.vn