These lawmakers are washing their hands of Menendez’s PAC money

About a dozen beneficiaries of Sen. Bob Menendez’s (D-N.J.) leadership PAC have either given back or plan to donate thousands of dollars they received from him in recent election cycles. They include his allies in the Senate as well as rising stars in New Jersey politics. 

Menendez, along with his wife, Nadine, and three businessmen, was indicted on bribery charges last month. More than half of Senate Democrats, along with many of the Garden State’s most prominent Democrats, have called for his resignation. 

Menendez denies the charges and says he’s not going anywhere. But many of his one-time allies are trying to wash their hands of the indicted senator, conviction or not. 

The Hill reached out to more than two dozen lawmakers who received campaign donations from the leadership PAC this year and during the 2021-22 election cycle. At least 10 of them confirmed they will give up the money. 

Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) was the first lawmaker to publicly say he would return Menendez PAC money, with a spokesman telling the Messenger, “We are in process of returning the money … in envelopes stuffed with $100 bills.”

Prosecutors accused the senator and his wife of receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in exchange for attempting to interfere with criminal investigations and advocating on behalf of the Egyptian government’s interests, among other things. Authorities found hundreds of thousands of dollars hidden around their house during a raid last year, along with gold bars. 

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) has been a rare Democrat arguing to give Menendez the benefit of the doubt as the legal process plays out. 

Asked whether he would give back a $5,000 donation he received from Menendez’s PAC in March, his office replied, “In the United States, we honor the rule of law and everyone is innocent until proven guilty. Until there is a verdict, this is an issue between the people of New Jersey and Senator Bob Menendez.”

Still, a number of other senators have joined Fetterman — who received a $5,000 donation last year — with some releasing public statements and others responding to questions from The Hill. 

Sen. Martin Heinrich’s (D-N.M.) office said he intends to donate the $5,000 donation he received in March 2023 to a local New Mexico nonprofit.

A spokesperson for Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) said he donated $10,000 received in April to Common Cause Pennsylvania, a group that advocates for voting access and government accountability.

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who like Casey is running for reelection in 2024, has donated $10,000 in campaign donations to veterans charities in Montana, according to a spokesperson. Tester received $5,000 this year and $5,000 in 2022. 

Sen. Jacky Rosen’s (D-Nev.) office also said she has donated the $10,000 she received last year to Nevada nonprofits. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) told CT Insider that he would give the $10,000 he received to “an appropriate charity.”

Some have followed suit in the House, including at least one aspiring senator. 

Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.), who is running for Senate, is in the process of returning the $2,500 she received in June, according to a spokesperson. 

She is joined by a number of members of the New Jersey congressional delegation.

Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman‘s (D-N.J.) office told The Hill that she will return the $5,000 campaign donation received last year. 

Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-N.J.) is donating the $5,000 she received last year to New Jersey charities that serve families experiencing homelessness, her office confirmed. 

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.), co-chairman of the Problem-Solvers Caucus, has donated $10,000 in last year’s contributions to “the Democratic Party to help Democrats win up and down the ballot this November,” per his spokesperson. 

However, a number of other lawmakers who have benefited from Menendez’s fundraising were either silent or vague in response to inquiries from The Hill and other outlets. 

A campaign spokesperson for Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.), who received $2,500 in the 2020 cycle and another $5,000 ahead of his 2022 election, told the Bergen Record that “with the federal charges brought last week, the campaign will also not accept any donations from the senator.”

A number of Democratic senators who received $10,000 from Menendez’s PAC during the 2021-22 cycle did not respond to questions about giving it back. They included Sens. Michael Bennet (Colo.), Tammy Duckworth (Ill.), Kirsten Gillibrand (N.Y.), Maggie Hassan (N.H.), Mark Kelly (Ariz.), Catherine Cortez Masto (Nev.), Alex Padilla (Calif.), Brian Schatz (Hawaii), Raphael Warnock (Ga.), Ron Wyden (Ore.) and Tim Kaine (Va.). Patty Murray (D-Wash), who received $5,000, also didn’t respond. 

In 2015, Bennet donated a $10,000 donation he received in 2010 from the Menendez’s leadership PAC to veterans charities, Politico reported. At that time, the former chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee was facing charges of running a bribery scheme. The case ended in 2017 with a mistrial due to a hung jury. 

A handful of House Democrats also did not respond to multiple emails from The Hill, among them his son Rep. Rob Menendez (N.J.),  and Reps. Donald Norcross (N.J.), Frank Pallone Jr. (N.J.), Adriano Espaillat (N.Y.). Payne and Rob Menendez received $10,000, Espaillat got $2,000 and the rest collected $5,000 during the 202-22 election cycle. 

Michael Muller, a New Jersey Democratic strategist, noted the relatively slow trickle of commitments to return PAC money compared to the flood of calls for the senator’s resignation in the days after his indictment. 

“Calling on him to step down, obviously it’s a very big moment for a lot of [the lawmakers], and as you look at how that drumbeat happened quickly, but on a lot of levels, we live in a real-time political world now where, if it’s not done within hours, it looks like it’s slow,” he said. 

“But frankly, there’s still internal political relationships — that takes a little bit more time to have some of those conversations.”