What are the 'forces behind the scenes' Bob Menendez is blaming? - Kelly

Bob Menendez, the senior Democratic U.S. senator from New Jersey who was accused on Sept. 22 of orchestrating a massive bribery scheme, is fighting two wars.

One war is set to unfold in a courtroom, before a judge and jury — with a determined group of federal prosecutors and the FBI seeking to prove that Menendez is a crook and an equally determined group of defense attorneys trying to save Menendez from prison.

The other war is far more difficult to define, though Menendez nevertheless alludes to it in trying to explain away his troubles. This war takes place in the court of public opinion. And Menendez’s adversaries come with an obscure name.

Menendez described them recently as “forces behind the scenes.”

What is Bob Menendez really talking about?

This would not be the first time a politician facing troubles conjured up a vague notion of an obscure enemy.

Hillary Clinton talked of a “vast right-wing conspiracy” against her. More recently, former President Donald Trump often cites what he calls “the deep state” in the federal bureaucracy that opposed his efforts to “Make America Great Again.”

What exactly is Menendez referring to as “forces behind the scenes”?

Interviews with a variety of political figures who have known Menendez at various points in his four-decade public career offer a conflicting political, social and psychological portrait of the senator’s sense of perceived enemies — and why he habitually blames them for his problems.

Some pointedly say Menendez’s use of the term “forces behind the scenes” is just a cheap, clumsy ploy, meant to divert attention from the charges against him.

“I don’t think such people exist. And I believe Bob Menendez knows they don’t exist,” said former state Sen. Loretta Weinberg, the progressive Teaneck Democrat and former supporter of Menendez who now has joined a growing list of party members calling on him to resign.

Like Weinberg, many other Democrats interviewed by NorthJersey.com and The Record offered similarly forceful views on Menendez and the corruption charges he now faces. But unlike Weinberg, many, saying they feared retribution by even a weakened Menendez, agreed to speak only if their names were withheld.

One compared Menendez’s blame of “forces behind the scenes” to a child’s lame excuse that a “dog ate my homework."

"It just doesn't add up," this Democrat said.

“The only ‘force’ that I could imagine pursuing him is a conscience he might not be recognizing,” said another Democrat, who happens to be a longtime party operative. “Menendez is using a Trumpian paranoia as his defense. Is that ‘force’ his own past?”

Pointing to Menendez's youth

Others offer a far more nuanced view of Menendez — one that is linked to his childhood.

They point to the fact that Menendez, the son of Cuban immigrants who grew up in Hudson County and broke numerous barriers as a Latino politician, has never been particularly well-liked by New Jersey’s Democratic machine, especially those anchored in the mostly white suburbs. As a result, he is continuously on guard.

“If you look through his history, in many ways he’s the first Hispanic to do a lot of things he did,” said one of Menendez’s longtime allies. “When he makes references to ‘forces’ against him, you need to remember what it was like to be the first one through the door and how difficult that was.”

Still others note that despite Menendez’s four decades in politics — from Union City’s school board to its mayor to the New Jersey Assembly and state Senate and then the House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate — he is decidedly private.

To those who first meet him, Menendez can seem gregarious. With his strong baritone, he often sings happy birthday to almost anyone who happens to be celebrating a birthday. And at a Democratic gathering at an Irish bar in Chicago years ago, friends remember him singing a heartfelt rendition of the tearful ballad “Danny Boy.”

But Menendez’s seemingly outgoing persona masks a lifelong shyness, many say.

He trusts and confides in only a very close circle of friends. As a result, Menendez is uniquely prone to viewing even his mildest critics as adversaries who may be trying to upend him.

This self-guarding persona can be traced to his first steps in politics.

In his hometown of Union City, Menendez emerged as a political reformer, elected to the school board as a 20-year-old college student.

A few years later, he helped federal prosecutors convict his political patron, Union City’s mayor and Hudson County's political kingpin, William Musto, of corruption.

Musto went to prison. Menendez became Union City’s mayor — and a leader in Hudson County’s Democratic machine. But fearing that his testimony against Musto might make him a target for assassination, Menendez, at the urging of law enforcement officials, wore a bulletproof vest for weeks when venturing out in public.

Such a history, observers say, turned Menendez into a sharp-elbowed combatant who was constantly looking over his shoulder for threats.

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'I refused to back down to the powers that be'

That fear emerged on Sept. 22, just hours after federal prosecutors released a 39-page indictment that accused Menendez and his wife, Nadine, of accepting cash, gold bars, mortgage payments and a Mercedes-Benz convertible in return for allegedly granting favors to three business associates. The senator released a statement that began with his longtime feeling that unseen enemies are out to get him.

“For years, forces behind the scenes have repeatedly attempted to silence my voice and dig my political grave,” Menendez said, without offering details. “Since this investigation was leaked nearly a year ago, there has been an active smear campaign of anonymous sources and innuendos to create an air of impropriety where none exists.”

Then, he turned to his ethnic roots.

“Those behind this campaign simply cannot accept that a first-generation Latino American from humble beginnings could rise to be a U.S. Senator and serve with honor and distinction. Even worse, they see me as an obstacle in the way of their broader political goals."

As if that were not enough, Menendez, who is considered a political power in his own right, tried to imply that even more powerful “powers” were at work against him. Again, he did not offer details.

“I have been falsely accused before because I refused to back down to the powers that be and the people of New Jersey were able to see through the smoke and mirrors and recognize I was innocent,” he said.

The strident statement, released by Menendez’s U.S. Senate office in Washington, D.C., echoed his similar sentiments after a federal judge dismissed corruption charges against him in November 2017 and declared a mistrial when jurors said they were unable to reach a verdict after an 11-week trial.

After U.S. District Judge William Walls told Menendez he could go free, the senator walked out of the courthouse in Newark and approached a crowd of reporters and camera crews.

He thanked his family and supporters. He started to cry, but calmed himself and turned to his perceived enemies.

“The way this case started was wrong, the way it was investigated was wrong, the way it was prosecuted was wrong, and the way it was tried was wrong as well,” Menendez said. “Certain elements of the FBI and of our state cannot understand or, even worse, accept that the Latino kid from Union City and Hudson County can grow up and be a U.S. senator and be honest.”

Menendez then issued his own vague threat. “To those who were digging my political grave so that they could jump into my seat, I know who you are, and I won’t forget you,” he said.

“Bob still views himself as an outsider,” said a former high-ranking Democratic official. “As a Cuban American, he’s not part of the old boys' network. And in the Senate, he’s definitely not part of the so-called ‘millionaires club.’”

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'Bob Menendez is an an outlier'

Yet another factor in Menendez’s sense of not being valued by his own party may come down to simple party politics — and his decision to buck the party on some crucial policy decisions.

One involves his intense criticism of President Barack Obama’s support for the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, also known as the Iran nuclear agreement.

Ignoring his party’s pleas, Menendez publicly opposed the plan, saying it allowed Iran too much leeway in building a nuclear bomb.

“Let’s be clear: What the agreement does is to recommit Iran not to pursue a nuclear bomb, a promise they have already violated in the past,” Menendez said.

Another departure point with his party was Menendez’s opposition to Obama’s decision to reopen diplomatic relations with Cuba and the authoritarian government of Fidel Castro. Menendez, then a rising star on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the agreement with Cuba “a bad deal.”

“Over the years Bob Menendez has not shied away from difficult political problems, even controversial political problems such as Iran and Cuba,” said Benjamin Dworkin, director of the Rowan Institute for Public Policy & Citizenship at Rowan University.

“In a career like that,” Dworkin said, “you’re bound to make powerful enemies.”

But did those “enemies” bring about a federal bribery indictment — again?

Micah Rasmussen, a former press secretary for Gov. Jim McGreevey and now the director of the Rebovich Institute for New Jersey Politics at Rider University, agrees that Menendez has long viewed himself as an outsider even though he is one of the unusual political figures to win elections at every level of the political ladder, from local to state to federal.

Rasmussen also suggested that one reason other Democrats also see Menendez as an outsider is linked to the senator’s admitted habit of accepting gifts and favors that resulted in three federal investigations by federal prosecutors.

The first federal investigation — in 2006 — did not result in an indictment. But for the past decade, Menendez has been tied up defending himself against two sets of indictments.

“To many Democrats, Bob Menendez is an outlier,” Rasmussen said. “But I wonder if Democrats view him that way because he plays fast and loose.”

“Another reason they’re mad at him,” Rasmussen said, “is how egregious these latest charges are. Even if he were acquitted, why do we have this guy accused of conducting this cash business like this?”

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'My biggest fight yet'

The opening scenes of Menendez’s legal war unfolded Wednesday in a paneled room on the 26th floor of the federal courthouse in lower Manhattan, with Menendez, his wife, Nadine, and three business associates all pleading not guilty to bribery conspiracy charges that could send each of them to prison for decades.

Bail was set for each. So was a date for an initial trial conference that would decide when the trial would begin and when prosecutors would turn over their investigative evidence to defense attorneys.

The mood in the packed courtroom was pensive, often filled with long silences — like a funeral.

Menendez, dressed in a blue-gray suit and blue tie, sat silently, speaking only to say “not guilty” when asked how he would answer the indictment.

Afterward, he walked from the courthouse, holding his wife's hand.

As he walked to the curb on New York’s Pearl Street and opened the door of a navy blue Lincoln MKZ sedan, Menendez paused for just a second and looked at the crowd of photographers and onlookers.

He smiled wanly. Then he slid into the back seat with Nadine.

As the car drove away, Bill Christeson, a self-proclaimed “democracy activist” who traveled from Washington, D.C., to watch Menendez, held a sign with one word: “Resign.”

It’s not clear Menendez saw the sign. If he did, he did not react.

So far, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy and Menendez’s colleague Sen. Cory Booker have asked him to resign. So have most of the state’s congressional delegation, 11 of New Jersey’s 21 county Democratic leaders and more than half of the U.S. Senate’s Democrats.

Menendez stepped aside from his chairmanship of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. But he promises not to give up his Senate seat. On Thursday, talking with Senate Democratic colleagues in a closed-door meeting, he reiterated his promise not to leave.

“This will be my biggest fight yet,” he said a few days before.

Maybe so. But who exactly are the “forces” trying to end Bob Menendez’s career?

It’s not clear a trial can answer that question.

The war being waged by those unseen forces has yet to be defined.

Mike Kelly is an award-winning columnist for NorthJersey.com, part of the USA TODAY Network, as well as the author of three critically acclaimed non-fiction books and a podcast and documentary film producer. To get unlimited access to his insightful thoughts on how we live life in the Northeast, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Email: kellym@northjersey.com

This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Bob Menendez indictment: 'Forces behind the scenes' chasing him