DAY SEVEN
After seven days, U.S. Senator Bob Menendez’s federal corruption trial will be on a one-week hiatus, with jurors returning on Tuesday, May 28. The break is less related to the holiday and more about allowing Menendez to tend to some personal business.
HERE’S WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW: A former State Department official testified that as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Bob Menendez had the power to sign off or place holds on foreign aid and arms sales.
DAYS SINCE THE INDICTMENT: 242
DAYS SINCE MENENDEZ’S LAST CRIMINAL TRIAL ENDED: 2,378
DAYS UNTIL THE NEW JERSEY FILING DEADLINE: 14
Menendez is not running in the June Democratic primary but has not ruled out running as an independent if he’s acquitted.
MISSED VOTES: 14
Menendez missed the vote to confirm President Biden’s nomination of a U.S. District Court Judge in Arizona who was confirmed by a 66-26 vote. He also missed two cloture votes, and a resolution disapproving a Department of Energy rule concerning gas furnaces that passed 50-45.
And in case you’re keeping track: it’s been 43 Years and 20 Days since a United States Senator from New Jersey was last convicted of accepting a bribe.
THE EDUCATION OF TRACEY TULLY
— X: “Things you learn in court: The 8 people crucial for the release of foreign military aid in Washington are known as the 4 horsemen and the 4 corners.” (Full Disclosure: I don’t know what this means, but it sounds interesting. Also didn’t know Wael Hanna had an assistant whose job was to count his gold.)
EGYPT DOESN’T LIKE STRINGS ATTACHED TO $1.3 BILLION IN U.S. AID
— Menendez jurors in NYC bribery trial hear from ex-State Dept. big about Egypt aid by Daily News’ John Annese: “Josh Paul, who until this past October worked as the director of congressional and public affairs for the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, testified in Manhattan Federal Court about how Egypt gets about $1.3 billion in funding annually from the U.S., around $300 million of which has strings attached. That amount is tied to whether Egypt is making progress on human rights issues such as the release of political prisoners … ‘Egypt did not like the idea that there were conditions in the first place, and did not like when funding was withheld,’ said Paul, who publicly quit his State Department job in October in protest over continued U.S. military assistance to Israel.”
EIGHTEEN YEARS AGO, STUCK IN THE ELEVATOR WAS MENENDEZ’S GOOD LUCK CHARM
— Trial of Sen. Bob Menendez takes a weeklong break after jurors get stuck in elevator from the Associate Press’ Larry Neumeister: “The trial of Sen. Bob Menendez grinded to a weeklong break on Tuesday after federal court jurors who were treated to a brick-by-brick build of the prosecution’s bribery case got stuck in an elevator a day after they were forced from their usual assembly room because of flooding. Judge Sidney H. Stein said jurors were trapped in an elevator for several minutes during what was supposed to be a 10-minute late-afternoon break that lasted almost a half hour. The elevator breakdown came as jurors were shuttled between floors to an assembly room because carpeting in their usual assembly room just outside the courtroom was found to be soaked on Monday after somebody left sink faucets on over the weekend. As jurors left for the day, Stein humorously warned them: ‘Don’t all get into one elevator.’”
THE SENIOR SENATOR IS THE JUNIOR DEFENDANT
— Trump circus overshadows Menendez trial from CNN’s Gregory Krieg: “Andrew Giuliani broke away from the press scrum across the street from former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial Tuesday and, holding his phone aloft as he livestreamed the latest from Lower Manhattan, promised his audience ‘more coverage here shortly.’ Asked about the other trial of note in the area – around the corner, less than 500 feet away – the son of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani squinted into the middle distance from Manhattan Criminal Court, where the defense had just rested its case. After a brief, confused silence, he smiled. ‘That’s right, of course,’ the onetime candidate for New York governor said. ‘Forgot about that.’”
ART BETTER THAN THE POMPIDOU
— Sen. Bob Menendez’s cluttered home loaded with $150K in gold bars, $480K in cash — some stashed in a boot: new photos from New York Post’s Priscilla DeGregory and Ben Kochman: “New photos shown at Sen. Bob Menendez’s federal bribery trial reveal over $600,000 in cash and gold bars stashed around his cluttered New Jersey home — including a stack of bills stuffed inside a Timberland boot.”
BOB MENENDEZ AS AURIC GOLDFINGER
— Gold bars are a big part of Bob Menendez’s corruption trial. There’s a reason for that from MSNBC’s Frank Figliuzzi: “In my FBI career, I’ve seen gold bars and diamonds turn up in criminal cases the same way we’ve seen in the Menendez case. That’s because it can be difficult to trace gold. While legitimate bars are marked and serialized by law, those markings tell us the maker and the bar’s purity, not who bought and sold it after it left the original dealer. The U.S. has reporting requirements for large cash transactions of any kind, but they’re sometimes ignored. It’s possible when you physically possess gold bars, versus an electronic investment account where you aren’t in possession of your gold, to anonymously buy and sell gold bars from a private, local seller with cash. This increases at least the perception that gold isn’t easy to track and is an easily liquidated asset.”
* Money stuffed in a Timberland boot
SENATOR ON TRIAL: DAY ONE | DAY TWO | DAY THREE | DAY FOUR | DAY FIVE | DAY SIX