Nadine Menendez: Wife of former US senator Bob Menendez found guilty of taking bribes in corruption trial

Nadine Menendez was accused by prosecutors of being her husband’s partner in crime and acting as go-between as the couple sold his power in exchange for cash, gold and a Mercedes convertible. Bob Menendez was found guilty last year on 16 counts of corruption. He is scheduled to go to federal prison for an 11-year sentence beginning in June.

Following the verdict, she echoed her husband’s criticism that the case was political. “I think this is politically motivated and this is all political,” Nadine Menendez said.

Jurors in Nadine Menendez’s case began deliberations on Friday afternoon and delivered their verdict on Monday afternoon (21 April). After they delivered it, her attorney Barry Coburn said they were “devastated” by the verdict but did not criticize the court, the jury or prosecutors and did not comment on plans to appeal.

The Menendezes were indicted in 2023 when fellow Democrat Joe Biden was in the White House. The roots of the case reach back further, starting at least as far back as 2019, during the first Trump administration. That May, FBI investigators doing surveillance apparently stumbled onto a dinner the Menendezes were having with an Egyptian official at Morton’s steakhouse a few blocks from the White House.

During both trials — of the former senator last summer and his wife this spring — prosecutors summoned to the stand a menagerie of witnesses from across the political spectrum and from within Menendez’s own inner circle. They included:

• A former undersecretary in the U.S. Department of Agriculture whose name was floated as a possible Trump agriculture secretary.
• A former State Department staffer who resigned in protest of arms sales to Israel.
• A former New Jersey attorney general who led enforcement at the Securities and Exchange Commission during the Biden administration.
• Menendez’s own former top political aide.
• A Democratic Party donor who was long Menendez’s friend.
• Plus, civil servants or professional staffers from across government.