Bob Menendez's Last Post As He Reports To Prison For 11-Year Sentence: 'How Weaponization Works'

Former Senator Bob Menendez is set to report to prison on Tuesday to begin serving an 11-year sentence after being found guilty of bribery charges.

Menendez has unsuccessfully tried to get a pardon or a commutation from former President Joe Biden and Donald Trump. An attorney for him has called the punishment a "life and death sentence" given the fact that the former senator is 71-years-old.

Menendez has been highly critical of the trial, and his last social media post before Tuesday argues that his case was weaponized. In a lengthy post on X last week, the former senator said "prosecutors broke the law to make sure they convicted me, by loading unconstitutional evidence onto a laptop they gave to the jury."

"The illegal evidence, that the Judge had ruled inadmissible, violated the Congressional immunity clause of the Constitution. The SDNY prosecutors effort to uphold the conviction, in the appeals court, is an effort to reduce Constitutional immunity for government actors. These are precisely the same laws relating to presidential immunity that came up in DJT's case. This is a threat to Presidential immunity," he added.

Menendez was sentenced in late January for taking bribes in exchange for favors that benefited a group of New Jersey businessmen, as well as the governments of Egypt and Qatar. He was found guilty on all 16 charges against him, becoming the first sitting member of Congress to be convicted of acting as a foreign agent.

Federal prosecutors called for him to get 15 years due to his "naked greed" and the "rare gravity" of his crimes. "This case is the first ever in which a Senator has been convicted of a crime involving the abuse of a leadership position on a Senate committee," the prosecutors wrote to the judge in a memo this month, according to ABC News, in reference to Menendez chairing the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

Menendez's lawyers sought leniency and urged the judge to consider a non-custodial sentence, saying "home detention and rigorous community service" would be enough. They called the prosecutor-recommended 15-year sentence "draconian—likely a life and death sentence for someone of Bob's age and condition."

Menendez, who pled not guilty, continues to maintain his innocence. "I have never been anything but a patriot of my country and for my country. I have never, ever been a foreign agent," he said after the verdict against him. He even attempted to run for re-election as an independent in the November election, but ended up dropping out as polls showed his chances of success were slim-to-none.

In another passage of his social media post, Menendez pointed at U.S. Attorney Damian Williams, claiming that he is close to Manhattan DA Alvin, Bragg and was mentored by former Attorney General Merrick Garland. The prosecution, he said, is politically motivated and aimed at raising his profile. "The bottom line is that Damian Williams is going to run for public office and all of these prosecutions are just ways for him to build credibility for a future political career," he added.

Authorities found gold bars worth more than $100,000 and almost half a million dollars in cash during a 2022 search of Menendez's residence. The bars' serial numbers showed they had been previously owned by Fred Daibes, one of the New Jersey businessmen charged with bribing Menendez. Over ten envelopes of cash with thousands of dollars also had his fingerprints.