Menendez approvals drop in Monmouth poll, with new federal investigation likely to blame

With yet another federal investigation ongoing, U.S. Senator Bob Menendez’s approval rating among New Jersey registered voters has dropped to 36% approve, 45% disapprove, according to a poll released this morning by the Monmouth University Polling Institute.

Menendez has long had a worse approval rating than other New Jersey Democrats like Senator Cory Booker and Gov. Phil Murphy. But his approvals today, down from 38%-38% in Monmouth’s January poll, are lower than they’ve ever been in a Monmouth poll before – and there are clear signs that the new investigation is to blame.

57% of poll respondents said they had heard about the investigation, which focuses on potential undisclosed gifts to Menendez and his wife. 27% said the investigation affects Menendez’s ability to serve as a senator “a great deal,” and 33% said it affects his ability to serve “some”; the remaining 30% said “not much” or “not at all.”

“Public opinion of Senator Menendez has ranged from positive to evenly divided to negative at different points over the past eight years,” Monmouth Poll director Patrick Murray said in a release accompanying the poll. “The current poll results suggest news of a new federal probe is having an impact on that opinion, perhaps even more so than the last time he faced similar scrutiny.”

That previous scrutiny reached a fever pitch in 2018, when Menendez was up for re-election shortly after a separate corruption case ended in a mistrial. The senator faced an unexpectedly close Democratic primary that year, beating an unknown challenger 62%-38%, but then won the general election against self-funding Republican Bob Hugin by a convincing 54%-43% margin.

Today’s Monmouth poll shows that Menendez could chart a similar path as he gears up to run for re-election in 2024. His approval ratings remain relatively positive with Democrats at 58%-23%, which would help him get through a Democratic primary; the only Democrat currently running against him is Kyle Jasey, a political newcomer whose mother is a state assemblywoman.

And although he’s underwater with independents 29%-45% and Republicans 14%-74%, few political observers think he would have any real chance of losing a general election in a presidential year. The last time a Republican was elected to the Senate from New Jersey was in 1972.

In a statement, Menendez advisor Michael Soliman said just that: the senator is popular enough among Democrats, and he’d be near-certain to win a general election.

“The Senator remains consistently strong among Democratic primary voters across the state in both polls and throughout his one-on-one interactions with residents,” Soliman said. “The numbers that matter are what voters say at the ballot box in November 2024.”

Given that 43% of poll respondents said they hadn’t yet heard anything about the investigation, that theoretically gives Menendez more room to fall – especially if a prominent challenger gets into the race and hammers him on it. But until then, mediocre approval ratings alone probably won’t be enough to sink him.

The Monmouth University Poll was conducted from August 10-14 with a sample size of 814 adults and a margin of error of +/- 5.4%.

This story was updated at 1:54 p.m. with comment from Soliman.