US Senator Bob Menendez pleads not guilty to foreign agent charge

WASHINGTON

US Senator Bob Menendez pleaded not guilty Monday to a single count of acting as an unregistered foreign agent, the latest charge brought by federal prosecutors as the New Jersey lawmaker faces a mounting corruption probe.

Menendez, a Democrat, entered his plea in New York before District Judge Sidney Stein, according to multiple reports.

Prosecutors charged Menendez alongside his wife, Nadine Arslanian, and New Jersey businessman Wael Hana with conspiracy for a public official to act as a foreign agent earlier this month. The trio had previously an initial tranche of charges brought by prosecutors.

An updated indictment alleges that from January 2018 through June 2022 the trio "willfully and knowingly" conspired to have Menendez act as a foreign principal of the Egyptian government and officials.

Menendez is accused of accepting bribes to use the power of his office to benefit three businessmen and the Egyptian government, including attempts to influence the outcomes of state and federal investigations, and passing restricted government information to Cairo. He has pleaded not guilty to those charges as well.

Arslanian and the businessmen -- Fred Daibes, Hana and Jose Uribe -- have also pleaded not guilty.

Hana is the owner of IS EG Halal, a startup company that won a lucrative contract with the Egyptian government to conduct all halal inspections for US exports to Egypt despite not having any experience.

He allegedly arranged meetings between Menendez and Egyptian officials "for corrupt purposes," including putting Menendez's wife on Hana's company's payroll "for a low-or-no-show job," in exchange for the senator's promise to facilitate arms sales and financing to Cairo, according to the indictment.

Investigators found more than $486,000 in cash when they searched Menendez's home in 2022, "much of it stuffed into envelopes and hidden in clothing, closets and a safe," in addition to gold bars, according to the indictment that was unsealed last month.

Menendez defended his decision to store the cash at his residence. He said he kept it "for emergencies and because of the history of my family facing confiscation in Cuba." He did not explain the alleged presence of gold bars.

The senator was born to a Cuban immigrant family in New York in 1954, but his family left the island nation well before the revolution that saw Fidel Castro assume power in 1959.

A federal grand jury returned a three-count indictment in September charging Menendez, his wife, Daibes, Uribe and Hana with conspiracy to commit bribery, and conspiracy to commit honest services fraud. The senator and his wife are additionally charged with extortion.

The corruption trial is the second during Menendez's decades-long career in public service.

A previous trial on accepting extravagant gifts from a doctor in the state of Florida ended in a hung jury in 2017, and prosecutors opted not to retry the senator.