Menendez dismisses calls to resign: ‘I’m innocent, what’s wrong with you guys’
thehill.com
Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) on Tuesday insisted he’s innocent as more than a dozen of his Senate Democratic colleagues called on him to resign over last week’s indictment on bribery charges.
Asked by a reporter on Tuesday at the Senate over why he isn’t resigning, Menendez had a quick and simple retort.
“Because I’m innocent,” Menendez said in response to a question from NBC News correspondent Ryan Nobles.
“What’s wrong with you guys,” Menendez added.
In keeping with Senate Democrats’ protocol, Menendez stepped down from his powerful position as chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
So they were flat-out lying about the gold bars and half-million in cash at his house? Because I can’t imagine any legit business where that’s required, or why it would be at his house instead of a safe deposit box.
Oh, that's just in case of household emergencies.
You just never know when you’ll have to pay a ransom on short notice.
He admits to the cash filled envelopes but claims that banks weren't trusted in his home country (Cuba IIRC) so he keeps plenty of money in cash.
While I don't doubt that there are countries like this, I don't buy this excuse. It also doesn't explain the gold bars oflr the Mercedes that the Egyptian government allegedly made payments on for him.
Is he innocent? In the eyes of the law, yes. Until he's convicted he's not legally guilty. That doesn't mean that this scandal can't hurt him politically until conviction though. For better or worse, the public makes judgements based on what they hear/see and this is pretty damning.
His home country? He was born and raised in New York.
Here's the article I read where he makes the excuse: https://news.yahoo.com/won-t-believe-menendez-defense-173624765.html
The article points out that he was born in New York City, not Cuba.
So even his excuse is as flimsy as it could possibly be.
It also doesn't explain how his indicted co-conspirators fingerprints and DNA (ew!) ended up on the money and envelopes or how the serial number on the gold bar shows it was also owned by the co-conspirator.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4221725-menendez-indictment-480k-cash-seized-emergencies/
I usually keep some krugerrands handy to tip the delivery guy
He was keeping the gold because he heard Reddit would pay him for it
Why don't you also have gold bars and unaccounted cash just lying around your home?
A lot of them probably do, but they're better at hiding it. Or maybe they're smarter and invest their bribes in stocks and such which aren't just laying around.
Innocent until proven guilty is about whether he goes to jail. He should resign from the because he can no longer fulfill his duties effectively.
Take a cue from Al Franken, ffs.
Not the best example. Dems screwed themselves with Franken. That was some number one bullshit.
It does feel like Democrats keep trying to take the moral high ground on everything and it doesn’t really do much for them. They’ll cut and run the moment it seems like there’s even of whiff of indiscretion in a Democrat. Meanwhile you’ve got Republican pedophiles and blatant liars running for office and a presidential candidate with 91 felony indictments with a still halfway decent chance of winning, this after 4 years of the most incompetently corrupt administration and a bungled coup attempt. Republicans are morally bankrupt, but they stick with their people, either because they’re so easily manipulated and/or the alternative is so unpalatable.
Indeed, dems screwed themselves. But he was impeccably honorable, and resigned because he couldn't possibly be effective any more. Not his fault, but also nothing he could do to fix it.
Menendez keeps saying he is innocent, but that is irrelevant. He is no longer useful as a senator, and he should resign.
Franken was right to step down.
“Hey, it’s just a joke” stopped being a valid justification sometime between my parents and my grandparents generation.
Even if that conduct was “normal” and “everyone did it” doesn’t fly either- because there’s plenty of times women will just go along because they’re afraid of what happens when they don’t. Or because peer pressure, or, you’re Senator Al Franken and they’re scared of loosing their job.
Truth is, it doesn’t matter if it’s accurate or not. The behavior was deeply inappropriate for anyone, never mind a senator, and as a senator he should have known cameras are everywhere and photos are very easy to misconstrue.
That said, he didn’t resign nearly as gracefully as they seem to remember- it took prettty much every female democrat politician stepping up and demanding it before he did.
You're misremembering how the whole scandal went down. Virtually all the allegations against them had huge holes in their stories and many of them were just straight up proven nothingburgers. It was such an obviously targeted character assassination. The ONE instance where he said "it was obviously a joke" was a picture that was taken where it was pretty fucking obvious that it was a joke. The comedian in that picture had similar pictures of her wrapping her leg around a married Robin Williams And pretending to smack his butt on tour. The pic of Al Franken pretending to "grope" her boobs while she's sleeping in bullet proof armor is a gag and not even the thing she made a complaint about (and in the pic his hands are very visibly NOT actually touching her).
Is it okay? It's definitely something I wouldn't have done, but I hardly find it an issue to lose your job over 15 years after the fact.
Anyway, check your facts before continuing to hate on the guy. Just remember that not all allegations are true, and virtually every senator that asked him to step down ended up regretting it later.
Am I remembering all this incorrectly? Because from what I remember, none of his objectionable behavior happened while he was a Senator, and in fact it happened before he even ran for office. Some of it happened in the context of a USO show he was acting in. I'm not making excuses for his behavior, but I think it's a very bad precedent to hold someone in office to a higher standard retroactively. I think Franken deserved a chance to keep his job and show redemption.
But contrast this directly with Menendez, who is accused of much worse behavior, while in office, that relates directly to his integrity.
Of course menendez should step down. And be prosecuted and all that.
Yes, he’s worse, my point is, Franken wasn’t wrong to step down.
Losing*
Loose is the opposite of tight
What an awful example. In fact, it is because of the rash decision by Democrats to turn on Al Franken, that I kind of agree with this guy. If he's proven guilty, then absolutely a different story, then throw the book at him. But he hasn't been proven guilty yet.
Democrats sure loooooove to turn on their own at the drop of a hat.
I'm not saying ALL politicians are bribe taking scum lords.
I'm just saying the pots are calling the kettle black.
"Come on, all of you have secret envelopes full of cash in your home and google the worth of gold bars and you know it!"
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) on Tuesday insisted he’s innocent as more than a dozen of his Senate Democratic colleagues called on him to resign over last week’s indictment on bribery charges.
Asked by a reporter on Tuesday at the Senate over why he isn’t resigning, Menendez had a quick and simple retort.
“Because I’m innocent,” Menendez said in response to a question from NBC News correspondent Ryan Nobles.
Menendez is accused of corruption and bribery, including accepting cash and gold bars in exchange for help through his influence as a senator and as chairman of his powerful committee.
The chair of the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm, Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), also called for Menendez’s resignation.
Rep. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) was the first New Jersey Democratic lawmaker to call for Menendez’s resignation.
The original article contains 269 words, the summary contains 131 words. Saved 51%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
LOL, innocent.
Maybe he sleeps on riches like cash and gold like a dragon...
Or he is a miser, or criminal miser. He should step down.