First congressional Democrat calls on Menendez to resign

stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to News@lemmy.world – 207 points – First congressional Democrat calls on Menendez to resign
thehill.com

Rep. Dean Phillips (D-Minn.) is calling on Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) to resign in the face of corruption charges, his office confirmed to The Hill. Phillips, a member of the bipartisan Problem Sol…

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Dean Phillips is a real one. He represented me while I lived in his area. I emailed him a couple of times to insist on the right to repair, find solutions to police brutality, protect Internet freedom, and various privacy votes.

Each time he personally called me. He himself. We'd have a conversation. And then when new votes came up around the same topics, he'd call me back to discuss. Once a year he'd call to get my opinion on how things were going in general and what I was concerned about. He also holds regular virtual town halls.

I should stress I'm nobody important, and he does this with anyone who engaged with his office.

If all reps were like him, our country would be much better off.

Amazing. I had to email my representative for a class, I sent him a letter backing a specific medical rights bill that was working through the legislature. The response from someone in his office. ‘We have noted your support for this bill, thank you’ .

Yeah most of them seem to have these vague responses that feel cooperate or just ... artificial. They use a lot of words to say, very little.

The one or two times my gf wrote a congressperson she got back a really long, generic letter that basically explained why they were voting the opposite way regardless, with phrases like “I understand your concern”.

There is zero downside for Democrats to insist Menendez to go, or force him to resign. If he refuses, defeat him in the primary. He should not be on the ballot in Nov 2024.

Uh... there's the Senate majority getting further thinned. Pretty sure this would result in a two party tie if he resigned at least until he could be replaced ... and that's assuming he's replaced with a Democrat.

That in turn means all kinds of potentially compromised confirmations.

It's sad that this is even a consideration. We shouldn't have to keep corrupt pigs in office because of who's team their on.

On the other hand, the "other team" tends to be full of corrupt pigs and it's arguably legitimately dangerous for the entire country.

It’s disappointing that to avoid giving republicans more power, democrats might have to tolerate having someone corrupt stay in office. We know that the Rs would never get rid of someone who might be replaced by a democrat as power is their #1 objective. Clarence Thomas, for instance.

Dems would still maintain their majority. To me it is worth it to take out the trash. But if you want to get realpolitik then I think it’s still worthwhile to not tolerate a prominent corrupt politician in your ranks. That could have electoral consequences for the party as a whole.

Sure, ideally they'd boot him out. Someone taking overt bribes doesn't belong in congress (the dumb thing is, there are so many ways to take non-overt bribes, which 95% of them do - have a family member hired by a lobbyist or foundation, for instance). It's just unfortunate that Republicans get an advantage since they'd never boot one of their own who was found guilty of corruption. They'd just ignore it or deny it, and their voters would either deny it or just not care also.

It depends on how New Jersey replaces senators.

In a lot of states, the Governor can appoint a replacement. In NJ, that would still be a democrat.

I dunno how NJ does it though.

Per the article, that’s two so far (only one from NJ), plus the governor of NJ.

I was shocked when he got re-elected after the last charges, but these are far more serious allegations. Time for him to go