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Robert "Bob" Menendez (born January 1, 1954) is the junior Democratic Senator from New Jersey. In January 2006, he was appointed by Jon Corzine to fill the seat made vacant by Corzine's resignation from the Senate to serve as Governor of New Jersey; Menendez subsequently won the seat in the November 7 general election later that year. Before his appointment to the Senate, he represented New Jersey's 13th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from 1993 to 2006. He currently resides in Hoboken. He is the first person of Hispanic ethnicity to represent New Jersey in the U.S. Senate. After the 2008 elections, Menendez was appointed to head the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. [1]
[edit] Personal lifeMenendez was born in New York City to Cuban immigrants Evangelina and Mario Menendez.[2] Fleeing Cuba in 1953 due to their dislike of the Batista government, his parents came to New York[3]. His father was a carpenter and his mother was a seamstress[4]. He grew up in Union City, New Jersey, where he graduated from Union Hill High School. After graduating with a B.A. from Saint Peter's College, he attended Rutgers School of Law-Newark in Newark, from which he obtained his Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree. He is a brother of Lambda Theta Phi Latin Fraternity, Inc.[5] He was admitted to the New Jersey Bar in 1980 and became a lawyer in private practice. He married Jane Jacobsen, a teacher for the Union City Board of Education, and the couple had two children: Alicia, a graduate of Harvard University, and Robert, a graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Menendez and Jacobsen have since divorced. During his free time, Robert Menendez helps out the future leaders of America. On the final day of the 2008 New Jersey American Legion Boys State, Robert Menendez was a prominent speaker. [edit] Early political careerIn 1973, at age 19, while attending Saint Peter's College in Jersey City, he launched a successful petition drive against his mentor, then-Union City Mayor William Musto, to reform the local school board. He was elected to the Union City Board of Education in 1974, and would later testify against Musto in a court case that resulted in a prison sentence for Musto. Menendez was elected mayor of Union City in 1986 and served as mayor until 1992. While mayor, he simultaneously served in the New Jersey Legislature, a common practice for New Jersey politicians. He was in the General Assembly from 1987 until 1991 and in the New Jersey Senate from 1990 to 1993, following the death of Christopher Jackman. [edit] United States House of Representatives
In 1992, 14th District Congressman Frank Guarini retired after seven terms. Menendez won the Democratic nomination for the Jersey City-based district, which was renumbered the 13th after New Jersey lost a district in the 1990 Census, and was easily elected that November. The district was already heavily Democratic, but had been redrawn with a Hispanic majority after the 1990 census. He was reelected six times with no significant Republican opposition. In 1996, Menendez was briefly a candidate in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate seat held by the retiring Bill Bradley, but he backed out and the seat was won by Democrat Robert Torricelli. In 2002 Menendez voted against the Iraq Resolution to authorize the invasion of Iraq.[6] In 2003, Menendez was elected chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, ranking him third in the Democratic hierarchy in the house, behind House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland. He was elected to chair the Credentials Committee of the 2004 Democratic National Convention and was a speaker on the first day of the convention. During the 107th Congress, he was chair of the Democratic Task Force on Education and the Democratic Task Force on Homeland Security. Although he is often portrayed as the political boss of Hudson County, he strongly dislikes this appellation, particularly because, according to an anonymous close source quoted in the December 11, 2005 Union City Reporter, "there is no boss of Hudson County".[7] Menendez is also seen as one leader in a fractured political establishment tenuously united by agreements that permitted the county to generate a significant vote for Corzine in the 2005 gubernatorial race.[citation needed] [edit] United States Senate
While several other names had been mentioned, Menendez was the early favorite among pundits for Governor-elect Corzine's replacement to fill the vacancy that would be created when Corzine resigned from the Senate. Corzine's decision to appoint Menendez got the support of several Latino groups, including the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. Menendez is the first member of a minority to represent New Jersey in the Senate, and only the sixth Hispanic to serve in that body. He joins Republican Mel Martinez of Florida (also of Cuban descent) and Democrat Ken Salazar of Colorado (of Mexican descent) as the only three Hispanics currently in the Senate. He is on the Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, Budget and Energy and Natural Resources committees. In February 2006, Menendez cosponsored legislation with New York Senator Hillary Clinton to make it illegal for foreign governments to buy U.S. port operations. The legislation was a direct response to Dubai Ports World's efforts to purchase Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O) of the United Kingdom, which operates six major U. S. ports. Menendez said, "Our ports are the front lines of the war on terrorism. They are both vulnerable targets for attack and venues for smuggling and human trafficking. We wouldn't turn the Border Patrol or the Customs Service over to a foreign government, and we can't afford to turn our ports over to one either."[8] On September 28, 2006 Menendez voted for the Military Commissions Act.[9] On June 12, 2007, Menendez endorsed Hillary Clinton's presidential bid and was given the position of National Campaign Co-Chair. Subsequently he made numerous media appearances voicing his support for her campaign.[10] On April 25, 2008, a former undercover F.B.I. agent revealed in the book Ruse: Undercover with FBI Counterintelligence that Cuban diplomats approached Robert Eringer to investigate Menendez. It was suggested that the Cuban government was determined to generate scandalous information about the senator, along with Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and Lincoln Diaz-Balart, because of their anti-Cuban lobbying efforts.[11] [edit] Committee assignments
[edit] 2006 allegations of ethics violationsOn August 27, 2006, two Republican state lawmakers filed an ethics complaint against Menendez, alleging he broke conflict-of-interest rules when he rented property out to a nonprofit agency that receives federal funds. Menendez helped the organization win designation as a federally qualified health care center in 1998. That designation allowed the agency to receive additional federal grants.[12] Menendez allies note that the organization in question, the North Hudson Community Action Corp., which provides social services and health care to the poor and was founded in 1960, had received federal funding for years before Menendez was in Congress, and receives its funding based on mathematical formulas.[13] Menendez maintains that he rented the property out below market-value because "he was supportive of its work".[14] The total rent collected over nine years was over $300,000. [edit] 2006 Senate electionMenendez successfully ran to retain his seat in the Senate. In the general election in November 2006, he defeated Republican Thomas Kean, Jr., current minority whip in the New Jersey Senate and son of former state governor Thomas Kean. The race had been considered one of the best hopes for a Republican to pick up a Democratic seat. With 99% of the precincts reporting, Menendez stood at 1,156,237 votes or 53% to Kean's 971,757 or 45%. However, Menendez's margin of victory, albeit comfortable, was the smallest for a Democratic incumbent in 2006, which may be related to the fact that Menendez had served less than one year in the Senate at the time of his reelection. Menendez was endorsed by the following major newspapers covering New Jersey politics: The New York Times,[15] The Philadelphia Inquirer,[16] The Star-Ledger,[17] and The Record.[18] [edit] Electoral history
*Write-in and minor candidate notes: In 1992, Donald K. Stoveken as an America First Populist received 682 votes. In 2000, Alina Lydia Fonteboa received 233 votes and Kari Sachs received 168 votes. In 2002, a candidate listed only as Independent (The American Party) received 34 votes; also, Herbert Shaw's full party name was "Politicians are Crooks - Politicos son Corruptos" (shortened for display purposes above).
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