Will Sen. Menendez's conviction do anything to curb corrupt NJ politics?

Sen. Bob Menendez’s conviction on bribery and corruption charges Tuesday sends a powerful warning that public officials need to tread carefully when navigating the murky area between gifts and bribes. But whether the 16 felony convictions will do anything to curb corruption in New Jersey politics is even murkier.

Speaking ahead of the verdict, Rutgers political scientist Ross Baker said a conviction of the state’s senior U.S. senator would end “one of the most important criminal trials involving a political figure in New Jersey.”

“And ending in a conviction means that a very prominent figure for a couple of decades in the state is going to be removed from the scene,” he said.

The last four months have issued high-profile blows to the power structures that good government reformers say breed corruption in New Jersey. Before the Menendez conviction, the powerful Democratic Party boss George Norcross was indicted for running what prosecutors allege is a criminal enterprise. A federal judge ruled against a ballot design system that has long given party bosses control over how voters view their options. But in New Jersey, one corrupt figure is often replaced by another. And recent overhauls of the state’s election financing and public records laws could facilitate more misdeeds, obscuring the paper trails needed to crack down on them.

Menendez was convicted of accepting more than $500,000 in cash, gold bars, a Mercedes-Benz and other gifts in exchange for helping three New Jersey businessmen and the governments of Egypt and Qatar. He hasn’t yet said if he’ll resign — or even if he might still pursue a reelection campaign as an independent — but the verdict could spell the end of a long political career and comes at a moment when corruption and reform are central topics in New Jersey politics.

“It all feels like a piece of the same thing – that we are not going to do politics as usual,” said Rutgers political scientist Debbie Walsh, referring to the confluence of Menendez and Norcross cases, as well as the changes to the state’s ballot design system. Walsh directs the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University's Eagleton Institute. “That some of the behavior that has been kind of a wink, wink, nod, nod, that folks can get away with, or that this is just the way business is done in our state, may in fact come to an end.”

Menendez sat out the Democratic primary for Senate in June. Democratic Rep. Andy Kim, who ran an anticorruption primary campaign for the Senate, will likely win the general election in November and take the seat Menendez has held since 2006.

“In some ways it's symbolic of the sort of revolution from beneath that's taken place in New Jersey politics,” Baker said.

Earlier this year, Kim faced Tammy Murphy, the governor’s wife, in the Democratic primary for Menendez's seat. But Kim was able to force Murphy out of the race despite the first lady’s endorsements from every major Democratic party boss in the state. Kim mounted a court challenge against the county line, the longtime practice of giving candidates endorsed by the party machines an advantageous position on the ballot. Murphy dropped out just before a court barred Democrats from using the design on this year’s ballots.

“The opposition to the nomination of Tammy Murphy, the legal problems of George Norcross, all seem like part of a larger movement that I think will reshape the politics of New Jersey for years to come, at least at the state level,” Baker said.

While Kim’s victory and Menendez’s ouster may signal a sea change, recent bills passed by the state Legislature call into question whether the state’s reputation for corruption is going to change any time soon.

Last year, the Legislature passed the Elections Transparency Act, which advocates say made tracking campaign cash even harder, by invalidating local pay-to-play laws and not requiring some campaign spending disclosures until after an election. And this year, the Legislature passed and Gov. Phil Murphy signed an overhaul of the Open Public Records Act, making it more difficult to obtain government documents.

In the view of Hector Oseguera, who ran for Congress against the Hudson County political machine in 2020, it makes sense that the Legislature would try to fight transparency while party leaders are under scrutiny for corruption.

“Those in power see people rising up,” Oseguera said. “So they'll claw at the power that remains and they try to remove transparency.”

If the past is prologue, the criminal conviction of a party boss or elected official in New Jersey has merely led to new people to fill those roles.

George Norcross, who is now under indictment for alleged racketeering and was long considered one of New Jersey's most powerful people, also got a boost from a criminal case early in his career. In 1978, Camden Mayor Angelo Errichetti appointed Norcross to the only government position he ever held, chair of the Camden Parking Authority. At that time, the young Norcross was raising money for Errichetti, but then the mayor and local party boss was indicted in the Abscam bribery case in 1981.

“George stepped in behind the scenes and filled the void,” Kevin Riordan, a reporter with the Philadelphia Inquirer, told the WNYC podcast “Dead End: A New Jersey Political Murder Mystery.”

The Norcross political machine grew and years later would become even more powerful after the most powerful party boss at the time, John Lynch, was convicted of mail fraud and tax evasion in 2006.

And Menendez ascended in New Jersey politics after testifying against his mentor and political boss, William Musto. In 1982, Menendez wore a bulletproof vest into a courthouse and testified against the mayor of Union City in a kickback scheme that involved Musto’s mob connections. Four years later, Menendez became the mayor of Union City and his political career took off from there — making him one of the most powerful officials associated with the Hudson County Democratic machine.

“Even with the conviction, I see a world where the clique that comprises the Hudson County Democratic Organization continues to engage in the same activity that leads one to get convicted in a situation like this,” said Oseguera, an attorney and a financial crimes analyst for a national bank who lives in Union City, Menendez’s political base.

Oseguera backed Hoboken Mayor Ravi Bhalla in his failed bid to oust the now-convicted senator’s son, Rep. Rob Menendez, in the Democratic primary.

And he said the younger Menendez remains positioned to aid the Hudson County political machine — by helping bring federal contracts and resources to local officials’ pet projects and priorities. The local machine, he said, “is where this power ultimately lies.”

Oseguera says fighting corruption will take sustained community organizing in Hudson County and statewide.

“The only thing, in my opinion, that would change New Jersey politics for the better is for grassroots people to become more activated and involved and for different people to essentially be elected,” Oseguera said, adding that he was encouraged by this spring’s rank-and-file revolt against the Tammy Murphy candidacy in many county party organizations.

“But I think that there does need to be a critical mass of people statewide who rise up against their local machinery and elect people who are not beholden to those systems," Oseguera said. "That, in my opinion, is going to be the only thing that actually makes a lasting difference in this form of machine politics.”

Another reason political reform in the Garden State hasn’t kept pace with other states is because New Jersey is made up of many small units of local government, which makes it hard to track government spending and contracts with the politically connected. A late state legislator wrote a book about the more than 560 municipalities and nearly 600 school districts in the state, calling it “multiple municipal madness.” Add gerrymandering into the mix, and it’s a recipe for corruption.

“Where we fall down a little bit is the lack of competition in many places,” said Michael DuHaime, a political strategist who has worked for many leading Republicans, including Chris Christie. “And that's not just that there's gerrymandering in Congress and in the state Legislature, which doesn't help in terms of one party systems. But there's a lot of places where there isn't a competitive opposition voice, which would help keep folks honest.”