U.S. Foreign Policy Will Be Better Off Without Menendez

His departure from the Senate one way or another will be a good thing for the country and the world.

Sen. Bob Menendez was indicted on federal bribery charges last week, and he made clear that he isn’t going to go quietly:

A defiant Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) brushed aside growing calls for his resignation Monday, declaring that he will be exonerated and will continue to serve in the U.S. Senate after a federal indictment alleging that he and his wife accepted bribes in exchange for exerting his political influence.

If the government’s claims are true, Menendez and his wife were brazen and sloppy in trading favors for gifts. Perhaps avoiding conviction in his earlier corruption trial made him think that he could get away with anything, or maybe he thought that there was so much legal corruption surrounding dealings with client governments that no one would notice a few illicit favors benefiting the Egyptian government. Even if he manages to stay out of jail, Menendez will be hard-pressed to come out of this with his political career intact. Considering that he spent much of that career supporting some of our government’s worst policies that inflicted collective punishment on tens of millions of people in several countries, his departure from the Senate one way or another will be a good thing for the country and the world.