New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez (Democrat), a vocal critic of cryptocurrencies, was found guilty by a jury on Tuesday of accepting bribes, including gold bars and luxury cars, in exchange for political influence.
Stacey Herbert, a member of El Salvador’s President Najib Bukele’s National Office for Bitcoin (ONBTC), said: I wrote to X While Senator Menendez “was hiding his ill-gotten gains, President Bukele was establishing the most transparent government in the world by opening up El Salvador’s public bitcoin addresses for the whole world to audit.”
Herbert added that “the villain is Bob Menendez” and that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which Menendez chaired, “owes President Bukele and El Salvador an apology.”
“This is not politics as usual. This is politics for profit,” he said. U.S. Attorney Damien Williams said in a statement“With Senator Menendez convicted, his years of selling his office to the highest bidder finally come to an end.”
Menendez has served in the House of Representatives since 1993 and has been a senator since 2006, but has refused to step down despite calls from senior colleagues, including the Senate Democratic Majority Leader. Chuck Schumer.
Menendez’s sentencing is scheduled for October 29 and he could face decades in prison.
