In any other year, the trial of a U.S. senator accused of aiding a foreign government would be the trial of the year, maybe even the decade.
But 2024 is no different year, and Senator Bob Menendez’s federal corruption trial isn’t even the trial of the month. It started last week in a federal courtroom, just steps away from former President Donald Trump’s state criminal trial.
Prosecutors in both courthouses, a brisk two-minute walk apart, debunk charges about a pair of politicians — one a Republican, the other a Democrat — whose fates are strangely intertwined, and may remain so.
The salacious nature of both cases will likely end up in some sort of political hall of infamy. Trump is accused of falsifying company records while paying off a porn star. Menendez is accused of acting as a foreign agent and being paid in gold bars. And both say they are being targeted by overzealous prosecutors who have long tried to take them to court and end their political careers.
“He is an American patriot,” Menendez attorney Avi Weitzman said in his opening statement last week. “He did not break the law. Period of time. And the U.S. Attorney’s Office’s claims are different [are] wrong. Completely wrong. Far from being a bribe man, Senator Menendez is a lifelong public servant.”
Menendez appears far more vulnerable given the severity of the charges, which carry decades in prison compared to up to four years for Trump, which he is unlikely to serve even if found guilty. Menendez also lacks the political support of his party and voters, which Trump claims.
As the Trump trial draws to a close, it’s possible some attention will turn to Menendez. But for now, Trump has – as usual – used up almost all the oxygen.
There’s a slew of TV cameras outside Trump’s courthouse, filled with anchors and all-day coverage.
Outside of the Menendez trial, it’s a handful of correspondents and photographers. The only anchor to appear in court during his trial was his own daughter, who works at MSNBC and has recused herself from covering the case.
During a lunch break this week, a crowd formed outside the courthouse where Menendez is. But they were there to take pictures of Trump’s motorcade.
Still, for a politician who values crowd size, Trump isn’t exactly greeted by a ticker tape parade every morning.
‘There were 100,000 people in Jersey on Saturday, and today there are five people. It’s very disappointing,” Brooklyn resident Dion Cini said one morning, taking advantage of Trump’s overcount at a recent rally in Wildwood, New Jersey. “Luckily I can’t cancel; You can’t cancel me. But most MAGA people are afraid that just having their picture taken will cause them to lose their jobs.”
Trump loyalists would do anything for the presumptive Republican nominee for president, but they have so far chosen not to show up en masse to protest the criminal proceedings that he and his surrogates have labeled a sham.
“They would like to show their support,” Trump recently told reporters in the courthouse hallway, but “outside it looks like an armed camp; you can’t get within three blocks of this courthouse.
But high-profile surrogates are taking turns accompanying the former president in court and have hosted brief news conferences in a nearby park. House Speaker Mike Johnson and names floated by as potential Trump running mates such as North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy cycled through.
The highest-profile Democrat who will appear in Menendez’s courtroom is likely Damian Williams — the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York who is prosecuting him.
There is more than just coincidence that unites Menendez and Trump.
The current indictment of both men will be a new test of the country’s ability to pursue public corruption cases. In recent years, prosecutors have lost a series of high-profile corruption cases against a range of political figures from both parties, including aides to Republican Governor Chris Christie involved in “Bridgegate,” former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, a Republican, and former Virginia Governor . New York Lieutenant Governor Brian Benjamin, a Democrat.
Menendez’s legal team, which was involved in a number of these cases before they began representing him, will obviously try to avoid a guilty verdict, but they will also try to keep legal options open for an appeal that could overturn any conviction to make. .
Although both men have pleaded not guilty and denied the charges against them, Trump has been more bombastic, attacking the Democratic prosecutor who filed the charges and the state judge overseeing the trial.
Menendez has made a number of complaints about prosecutors, especially since this is his second corruption trial in less than a decade. The first ended in a mistrial. But he can’t use the partisan witch hunt because the Justice Department, like him, is run by Democrats.
Yes, Menendez’s lawyers have accused prosecutors of filing the charges in New York to avoid a trial at the senator’s home base in New Jersey. They have also accused prosecutors of trying to take down Menendez.
But their sharp words are buried in legal documents and not broadcast during rallies, press conferences and social media like Trump’s attacks.
While president, one of Trump’s final acts was to commute the lengthy prison sentence for Medicare fraud of Menendez’s friend and former co-defendant in a separate corruption case. That case ended in a mistrial, but the friend, Dr. Salomon Melgen, of Florida, went to prison in a related case.
Perhaps the most consistent group offering Trump moral support outside the courthouse: New Yorkers of Chinese descent. At the end of the day, when their numbers swell to about 20, they like to run from the park to a nearby intersection where they can see the former president’s motorcade and wave to him.
“We want to show the court: stop the political persecution,” said Ai Wang, 67, of Queens. “If you do political persecution, it is the Chinese Communist Party. This is America.”
That’s probably something both men could agree on.
A family of four from Nashville recently took selfies with the courthouse as their backdrop. They said they were neither for nor against Trump.
“It’s just an observation of history in the making,” said Bobby Robertson, who traveled to Manhattan to celebrate his daughter’s 10th birthday with tickets to the Westminster dog show.
The child didn’t hesitate when asked which news event she thought was more important, chirping, “The dog show!”
