Bob Menendez resigns from US Senate after corruption conviction

Long-time New Jersey politician found guilty on 16 criminal counts last week

Bob Menendez during a Senate foreign relations committee hearing in December last year. AP

US Senator Bob Menendez resigned on Tuesday after his conviction on corruption charges including bribery and acting as a foreign agent, bowing to pressure from fellow Democrats to step down.

Democratic New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy will appoint a replacement for Menendez, who has represented the state in the Senate since 2006 and served as chairman of the foreign relations committee.

He resigned from the committee after being charged last year.

Menendez, 70, was found guilty on July 16 by a jury in Manhattan federal court on all 16 criminal counts he faced – which also included obstruction of justice, wire fraud and extortion – after a nine-week trial.

Two co-defendants also were convicted.

Numerous Democrats had called for Menendez to resign, including Mr Murphy, Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, and Cory Booker, New Jersey's other senator.

“If he refuses to vacate his office, I call on the US Senate to vote to expel him,” Mr Murphy said after the verdict last week.

Menendez's resignation letter was read out on the Senate floor.

The case centred on what prosecutors called bribery schemes in which he and his wife Nadine Menendez accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gold bars and car and mortgage payments from three businessmen.

In a 2022 raid on the Menendez home, FBI agents confiscated gold bars worth nearly $150,000 and more than $480,000 in cash, some of it stuffed into boots and jackets emblazoned with the senator's name.

Menendez, in exchange, steered billions of dollars in US aid to Egypt and tried to influence the criminal prosecutions of two of the businessmen, prosecutors said.

During the case, prosecutors told of instances where Menendez helped the businessmen, saying his efforts to fast-track the delivery of $99 million in helicopter ammunition to Egypt and close communication with senior Egyptian officials showed he was serving Cairo's interests.

Menendez plans to appeal.

US District Judge Sidney Stein set Menendez's sentencing for October 29, a week before the November 5 election in which he is running as an independent for another six-year term in the Senate.

The resignation will temporarily reduce the Democratic majority in the Senate to 50-49 until Mr Murphy's appointment is sworn in to finish Menendez's current term, which ends in January.

The trial was his second, after one in 2017 ended in a deadlocked jury. He was, however, censured by the Senate ethics committee for accepting gifts from a wealthy, long-time friend in exchange for official favours.