Senator Robert Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat charged last month with taking bribes in exchange for lucrative political favors, faced a stunning new accusation on Thursday — that he conspired to act as an foreign agent of Egypt even as he served as the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Manhattan federal prosecutors filed the fresh charge against Mr. Menendez and his wife, Nadine Menendez, as well as a third defendant, Wael Hana, accusing them of conspiring to have the senator act as a foreign agent without registering with the Justice Department. The prosecutors have asked a judge to seize the Menendezes’ residence in Englewood Cliffs, N.J., as well as a Mercedes-Benz convertible that the government says was given to them as a bribe.
The charge cuts to the heart of Mr. Menendez’s Senate oath to “bear true faith and allegiance” to the United States and is certain to intensify pressure for him to resign from office. It accuses him of violating an explicit prohibition on public officials serving as agents of foreign powers and appears to be the first time a sitting senator has been charged under the World War II-era Foreign Agents Registration Act.
Mr. Menendez, 69, Nadine Menendez, 56, Mr. Hana and two other businessmen were accused last month in what prosecutors described as a scheme to use the senator’s influence to increase U.S. aid and military sales to Egypt in exchange for hundreds of thousands of dollars, bars of gold bullion and the Mercedes-Benz. In court hearings last month, all five defendants pleaded not guilty.
Mr. Hana’s lawyer, Lawrence S. Lustberg, scoffed at the new conspiracy charge.
“The new allegation that Wael Hana was part of a plot concocted over dinner to enlist Senator Menendez as an agent of the Egyptian government is as absurd as it is false,” Mr. Lustberg said in a statement, adding that Mr. Hana would “vigorously defend” against this and the other charges.
Mr. Menendez has called the earlier accusations against him false and said he will be cleared of wrongdoing. Lawyers for the senator and Ms. Menendez did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Thursday.
After the initial indictment was made public last month, Mr. Menendez stepped down from his position as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. He has rejected calls to resign from the Senate from fellow Democrats. Thursday’s new charge is likely to intensify that pressure.
In a sign of his defiant stance, Mr. Menendez was scheduled to host a major fund-raising retreat for donors of his political action committee starting Friday at a luxury resort in Puerto Rico. Officials in New Jersey said as recently as Wednesday that were also getting calls from people close to Mr. Menendez asking them to contribute to the senator’s defense fund.
The new indictment charges that from 2018 through 2022, Mr. Menendez, his wife and Mr. Hana conspired to have the senator act as an agent of Egypt. It also suggests he was fully aware of the requirements of the Foreign Agents Registration Act.
In fact, the indictment says, Mr. Menendez during that period asked the Justice Department to open an investigation into a former member of Congress for failing to register under the law known as FARA.
In a May 2020 letter to the head of the department’s national security division, Mr. Menendez wrote, “The Act is clear that acting directly or indirectly in any capacity on behalf of a foreign principal triggers the requirement to register under FARA.”
Mr. Menendez posted that communication on his Senate office website, the indictment says. The May 2020 letter from Mr. Menendez to a Justice Department official asks for a review of whether David M. Rivera, a former Republican congressman from Florida, should have registered as a foreign agent for work he had done for the government of President Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela.
“The last thing we should tolerate is a former member of Congress potentially violating U.S. laws as he does the regime’s dirty work in the United States,” Mr. Menendez wrote.
This is not the first time that Mr. Menendez has faced federal corruption charges. He was indicted in New Jersey in 2015 in what prosecutors described as a bribery scheme to trade political favors for a wealthy eye doctor for gifts worth close to $1 million, including high-end travel and campaign contributions.
The case went to trial in 2017 but ended in a hung jury.
The new charge left historians grasping for precedents. An Ohio senator was accused of conspiring to commit treason in the early 19th century. But Mr. Menendez is the first senator charged under FARA since Congress passed it in the 1930s to target Nazi propagandists. According to records from the Senate historian’s office, he also appears to be the first sitting senator ever charged in two separate bribery schemes.
Tracey Tully contributed reporting.
