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Brian Lehrer: It's the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. Well, New Jersey, we have a governor's race. As expected, Republican Jack Ciattarelli came very close to defeating Governor Murphy four years ago, cruised to victory in that primary, and in the end, the Democrats primary wasn't all that close either. As of this morning, with 90% of the vote counted, Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill was up 14 points over her nearest rival, Newark mayor, Ras Baraka, that is, Sherrill was getting 34% of the vote to Baraka's 20, and with the other candidates down from there. It's on to the general election, and off they go. Oh, this is from Ciattarelli's website, "This November, we're going to deliver the ultimate referendum on the left's failures by flipping the New Jersey governor's mansion red and sending a tidal wave of reforms over Trenton, so enjoy this victory. It's yours after all, but the fight continues. Radical leftist Mikie Sherrill is officially the Democrats nominee." There's that. Ciatarelli's homepage also thanks President Trump for endorsing him in the primary. For Sherrill's part, in her victory speech last night, she wasted no time in leaning into that fact.

Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill: A state like this is not going to be led by a Trump lackey like Jack Ciattarelli.

[applause]

Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill: I am ready to make life more affordable for families. Jack has raised taxes at every level of government. He raised taxes as a council member, he raised taxes as a commissioner, and you guessed it, your taxes went up when he was an assembly member.

Brian Lehrer: If Sherrill is tying Ciattarelli to Trump, Ciattarelli is tying Sherrill to her, tying him to Trump.

Republican Jack Ciattarelli: Mark my words. While we focus on these key New Jersey issues, my Democratic opponent will do everything in her power to change the subject. Trust me, if this campaign were a drinking game and you took a shot every time Mikie Sherrill says, "Trump," you're going to be drunk off your ass every day.

Brian Lehrer: They are off and running. With us once again, WNYC and Gothamist New Jersey observer, host of the monthly Ask Governor Murphy call-in, for another few months, anyway, Nancy Solomon. Hi, Nancy, and happy morning after.

Nancy Solomon: Good morning, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: The Democratic primary results, Sherrill over Baraka by about 14 points, everyone else below that. Do you have a take on how and why?

Nancy Solomon: I think probably the most interesting numbers that came out of yesterday is that the two progressive candidates in the race, Ras Baraka and Steve Fulop, basically got a few more votes than Mikie Sherrill, total, when adding up both Baraka and Fulop. It shows this was somewhat expected that Baraka and Fulop-- you could see it happening as the campaign was going on that they were splitting the progressive vote just in terms of which groups were endorsing them and the lawn signs and which towns where they were popular. Various responses to them. You could see the progressive vote in the Democratic Party splitting some for Baraka, some for Fulop.

I think that's probably the most interesting thing to see out of the numbers is that-- Congratulations to Mikie Sherrill. She did very well. I don't want to undersell her 34% total that won the race, but this is what certainly helped her, was Baraka and Fulop splitting that vote.

Brian Lehrer: No ranked choice voting in New Jersey, despite the crowded field, unlike New York City. That means Sherrill won with only a third of the vote. Two thirds voted for other candidates. Do you think there's enough ambivalence among Democrats who voted for the others that she has a unity or consolidation task ahead of her very much, before we even talk about wooing the swing voters?

Nancy Solomon: I guess, I think both things are true. I don't think she is going to face a split party that isn't going to rally behind her for the general. I don't think it's going to go that far, but I do think there is some coalition building that she's going to need to do. Baraka spoke to that last night specifically. He pledged his support for her. He said, "We can't let Ciattarelli win." He also said, and this is a quote, "We need to bring the party together for all the nooks and crannies of the state." I love that.

He was putting his power base out there basically as a-- and he said, "We're going to have to have some talks in the Democratic Party about what this party should be," and that there's a need for more input from working class families. We need to lift the party up and get people involved. Basically he's saying, "I now have a bargaining chip and I'm going to fight for some more progressive policies and politics and more, maybe, representation of people of color that are part of the campaign and would be part of a next administration if she were to win."

Brian Lehrer: We are New York and New Jersey Public Radio and live streaming at wnyc.org, obviously on the New Jersey side right now as we talk about the gubernatorial primary results from last night with Nancy Solomon. If anybody has a question or comment, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. Call or text. Anything else surprising to you, Nancy, from the Democratic results, maybe why Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop didn't come closer than he did or anything you're keying on?

Nancy Solomon: Yes. Lots. I've been saying all along that Steve Fulop, while he had really passionate support from progressives around the state, and hats off to him, he ran a very good campaign, but Jersey City activists and Jersey City progressives have not been happy with him for several years. You see the results from yesterday that he did not win Hudson County and Mikie Sherrill did. That's interesting.

Brian Lehrer: Home of Jersey City?

Nancy Solomon: Yes, thank you.

Brian Lehrer: That's the point.

Nancy Solomon: Yes, that's the point. There was that. Steve Sweeney, the candidate from South Jersey, former Senate president, also very closely aligned with the party boss of South Jersey, George Norcross. Mikie Sherrill beat him in Camden County, the Norcross base of all of South Jersey. It's interesting that those folks didn't do as well in their own home bases. Steve Sweeney, let me just-- as a caveat, he did win Gloucester County, which is his actual home base, but Camden is really the center of South Jersey Democratic politics.

To me, that was quite interesting.

I thought the best tweet of the night will award to C.J. griffin, a public interest lawyer. She's an advocate for transparency and open records, well known among the activist crowd. She tweeted last night, "The real loser of the night is Sean Spiller. What a waste of $40 million. Lots of student lunches and classroom supplies could have been purchased rather than trying to buy an election." Ouch.

Brian Lehrer: Oh boy, because it was teachers union money primarily, right?

Nancy Solomon: Yes, $40 million worth of teacher union money. He didn't raise enough money otherwise, outside of that pot of gold, to qualify for matching funds or to be in the official debate. It was really a teacher union funded campaign.

Brian Lehrer: From their [unintelligible 00:08:55]. Listener texts, "Hi, Nancy. I loved Dead End, one of the best podcasts." I'll remind everybody, that was her podcast about things related to the Norcross machine in South Jersey. The listener asks, "Was Norcross visible in this campaign? Did he endorse anyone?"

Nancy Solomon: It's a great question and thank you. Maybe, Brian, we should mention that we are going to talk about the next season of Dead End later in this conversation, right?

Brian Lehrer: Yes. We are having to do with a actually much better known statewide and even nationally known New Jersey politician who's about to go to prison, but that's coming up in a few minutes.

Nancy Solomon: Yes, hint, hint, has to do with gold bars. I would say Norcross had a pretty low profile. I wasn't really on the ground in South Jersey to know a whole lot, but I'd say he had a pretty low profile. Here's a guy who is-- he'd been indicted in a massive corruption and racketeering case and then that indictment has been thrown out, and the dismissal is now under appeal by the state attorney general and may come back. He was freed up from that, but I don't know to what extent that played a role and how much he's involved. I'm sure he's involved behind the scenes.

Brian Lehrer: Probably, in helping Sweeney because that's the South Jersey alliance, right?

Nancy Solomon: Yes. I heard one political commentator last night say that maybe the Norcross machine was a little more focused on some of the opposition reform candidates that were taking on assembly seats. Well, they care about the governor.

Brian Lehrer: About the legislature because that's where really they exert their power, right?

Nancy Solomon: Yes. To tell you the truth, from months ago, I was surprised that we didn't see George Norcross force Steve Sweeney out of the race and consolidate his power with Josh Gottheimer, who was the Bergen County congressman. I thought that would have been a winning lane for Gottheimer if he could have pulled the machine from South Jersey behind him, but that didn't happen. You can see the fracturing of the vote with the six candidates. It was a problem for all of them, really.

Brian Lehrer: Before we move on to the Republican primary results and then start to run the general a little bit between Sherrill and Ciattarelli, it sounds like from what you're saying, as well as she did in the home county of Steve Fulop, as well as she did in South Jersey, the home area of Steve Sweeney, that she established herself as a pretty big tent candidate, at least in terms of those who vote in Democratic primaries.

Nancy Solomon: I think Mikie Sherrill has been consistent from the beginning of her political career. That's been her message, that's been her identity, is about big tent Democratic politics. It angers some on the left. They don't like it. They disagree with some of her politics. She puts out her identity and bio as a former Navy pilot a lot. It's a big part of her shtick, if I could say that.

Brian Lehrer: She brings it up a lot in interviews, too, I'll note from experience.

Nancy Solomon: Yes, and it's all over her advertising. I talked to one political consultant just a few days ago, who thought that the campaign had made some big mistakes in focusing too much on her biography and not enough on what she's going to do, and that Fulop was really killing it with a very detailed plan about how to fix the problems that people want fixed.

It'll be interesting to see whether the campaign learns from the primary and going forward, maybe de-emphasizes her bio a little bit and emphasizes more policy, which isn't to say she doesn't have any policies. She does, but I was told that she could do better on that end and she would have appealed. What Mikie Sherrill has in spades is the ability to reach a lot of voters in New Jersey. Look at this vote. This vote shows you that, yes, in a Democratic primary, about half the voters will vote progressive, but the other half won't. That's a primary where you get-- the base is a big chunk of your voters.

In a general, and you and I have talked about this a lot, there are so many registered independent voters in New Jersey. I'm not saying that means all independent voters are moderate or all independent voters are swing voters. They're independent because they don't want to register with a party, but that's a big group of people. We've seen with progressive candidates in past years. Sue Altman running for Congress in the 7th congressional district last year. Great candidate, really strong progressive politics, ran a good campaign.

Brian Lehrer: She lost.

Nancy Solomon: Could not win in a purple district.

Brian Lehrer: To that point, listener writes, "The New Jersey results show that there is a solid moderate Democrat base that supported Sherrill, and it is the hope of the party nationally." Another listener writes, "Listening to today's gubernatorial election responses." This is in reference to the clip we played from Sherrill's victory speech last night. "Democrats are falling into the trap. Stop focusing on Trump." Also to that point, I think, Susan in Summit, you're on WNYC. Hi, Susan.

Susan: Oh, hi. Thank you for taking my call. I'm really concerned about that because I don't want things to turn out like they did for Kamala, although I really think she didn't win also because men didn't want to vote for a woman. That concerns me here. Mostly, Mikie is great, but she's got to stop talking about Trump. Why give him publicity when there's so many other things voters want to hear, which was obvious in the presidential election? I just hope her rhetoric will, I know it's hard, try to keep Trump out of it and give him publicity.

Brian Lehrer: Thank you, Susan. We played those clips of Sherrill and then Ciattarelli basically saying, "She's going to campaign all day against Trump." How much of a factor do you think their takes on Trump will be in this race, which, of course, historically for New Jersey governor, would be more about things like property taxes and education funding?

Nancy Solomon: Exactly. Two things. I think that we're going to see a pivot. It's not that she's not going to talk about Trump, but I think we are going to see a pivot away from a lot of it because it was unavoidable for the Democratic primary. You couldn't help but see how much voters wanted the candidates to assure them that they were going to be the tough, strong person that was going to do something about Donald Trump and to protect the state of New Jersey against any kind of federal incursion or cuts.

I think all the candidates gravitated towards addressing that because you could feel it, you could see it. It was palpable among the voters showing up at all of the events that were happening and all the debates, people wanted them to talk tough about Trump. Now, I think we'll see less of that. I think it's unavoidable. I think Mikie Sherrill is most certainly going to have to talk about Donald Trump. She's going to have to talk about immigration. She's going to have to talk about what she's going to do to make up for the Medicaid funding cuts that are coming our way. She's been in Washington doing this work. I think we'll see a little bit of both.

Let me just say one more thing, Brian. One of the people who texted in talked about-- that moderates voted for Mikie Sherrill and progressives didn't. That's not entirely true. I think there are a lot of progressives in New Jersey who saw that electability was a key issue for them, and they believed that Mikie Sherrill was the one who could beat the Republican in November more than Steve Fulop or Baraka. The many, many, many people who voted for Baraka and Fulop thought that one of them was the one who could win in November, but I think a lot of people voted on that issue of electability.

Brian Lehrer: Nancy Solomon with us as we break down the results from yesterday's New Jersey gubernatorial primaries. Mikie Sherrill, the winner on the Democratic side, Jack Ciattarelli, the winner on the Republican side. No surprise there about Ciattarelli, but if Jersey Republicans are trending more MAGA like other Republicans around the country, which you've said they are, and Ciattarelli wasn't always in that camp, why didn't the firebrand talk show host Bill Spadea come closer than he did?

Nancy Solomon: Well, he didn't get Trump's endorsement, and I think that was the end of his campaign right there when that happened a few weeks ago. Ciattarelli, he is a very strong candidate for the Republican Party in New Jersey for a few reasons. One, he's got now the Trump stamp of approval, and he'll probably get some help from Trump during the campaign, because we've seen Trump cares about this race deeply and wants a Republican to win to show that it's a referendum on his success. There's that.

Ciattarelli has a long history of being a moderate Republican with a lot of respect and support. Even though he has clearly moved to the right, I think a lot of Republicans and probably a good number of independents associate with him an older style of New Jersey Republicanism that they like. They see the whole Trump thing and the MAGA thing as a way to get elected, but they don't really care about it that much.

The other thing I'll say about Ciattarelli is that, I'm constantly thinking about what a senior producer in the WNYC newsroom, Joe Capriglione, said to me. Joe grew up in New Jersey. He said, "If you grew up in New Jersey, you know a guy like Jack Ciattarelli." He's just so relatable. He's just such a typical, Jersey Italian guy and that he's relatable. This being his third campaign, now his name recognition is much higher than it used to be, I think he has a very good shot at this race, and I think he could be a very strong candidate.

Brian Lehrer: He only lost to Governor Murphy by a few points four years ago when he was a Republican nominee then. You've been very clear that even before you look at current conditions, history suggests that this will be a competitive election, not a shoo-in for the Democrat in so called blue New Jersey, because the governorship- unlike US Senate, which is the other statewide election, the governorship keeps going back and forth between the parties.

To his relatability to a certain group of people from New Jersey, here's the first line from Ciattarelli's bio on his campaign page. A lifelong Jersey guy, Jack was born in Somerville and raised in the borough of Raritan where his grandparents immigrated a hundred years ago. There you go.

Nancy Solomon: I think it works for him. He's good with the retail politics. He's open and friendly. He's good at getting out there and shaking the hands. In going back to the history of this and the fact that the governor's seat has really flipped back and forth between the parties evenly over the last 50, 60 years, it's also been-- I think 1961 or 1962, I guess it would be '61 is the last time that the party that had held the governorship for two terms won the election moving now into a third straight term of one party. That's a long way to go back to find a situation in which that happened.

There's also another interesting thing which is that the party that holds the White House has trouble getting the governor elected in New Jersey. That's Republicans. This could be a year that breaks the mold and has those two different forces in play, which I think it really does have those two different forces. Republicans and maybe non-Republicans, which is independents and regular other folk, are tired of Phil Murphy and frustrated, want something new and want their property taxes to go down. Then of course there are all of those who are upset with Donald Trump and are going to come out and vote. It's going to be an interesting race.

Brian Lehrer: They are, I guess, both going to run on their bios, to some degree, in addition to policy differences in Trump and other things. I just read that little bit of Ciattarelli's bio, from his webpage. It goes on, "He earned a degree in accounting from Seton Hall, where he also got his MBA. Jack is a successful entrepreneur and small business owner twice over, having founded two successful Main Street businesses right here in New Jersey. Of all the titles he's earned, he's most proud to be called, 'Dad.'" That's there.

On Sherrill's, "US Naval Academy graduate, Navy helicopter pilot, former federal prosecutor, wife and mother of four kids." We'll note that they are both touting the fact that they have four kids.

Nancy Solomon: I can't remember what the quote was exactly, I think maybe it was in the tape you played at the top of the show, that Jack Ciattarelli is attacking Mikie Sherrill as being too woke for New Jersey. It's going to be a hard case for him to make. This is the thing about her, is that they can't really tar her with the same brush that they can lots of other Democrats, progressives, whatever you want to call.

She has that biography that really speaks to a much more mainstream voter, which New Jersey is full of. There's been a lot of talk about the Democratic machines and how they supported her. Is she too establishment? I think one of the reasons the machines were so behind her is because they think she's a winner. They think she's a great candidate who can cross over and get independent voters behind her. That's why a lot of people supported her candidacy.

Brian Lehrer: Here is a voter who you may have just described with that category. John in Bradley Beach, you're on WNYC. Hi, John.

John: Hey, Brian, thanks. Long time, multi time. Nancy, a few moments ago, just described exactly me. My personal politics are much more closely aligned with a Ras Baraka or a Steve Fulop. I did see Fulop speak and I really, really liked him, but I'm interested in winning, and I do see Sherrill as a winner. I know she's been really effective in Congress. When I heard that that is the candidate that the Republicans fear most, I said, "I'm voting for Sherrill." I did a while ago.

I want to throw out one other thing. Steve Fulop had what I thought was a great idea, and I'd be interested if a reporter would ask Sherrill if she would keep on Matt Platkin as the AG because of all the lawsuits against Trump. It just seemed like it made perfect sense, the continuity. Somebody needs to ask her that now that she's the nominee.

Nancy Solomon: I had the exact same thought. I'm a fan of the attorney general. I'll say that right out there. I'm impressed with what he's done, and I've seen changes at the attorney general's office that we haven't seen- and I've seen action by the attorney general's office that we haven't seen in 20 years.

I think Mikie Sherrill could make huge inroads into the progressive Democratic wing, that is resistant to her, by making that pledge. Part of what he's doing right now that Matt Platkin is so involved in is suing the Trump administration. He's been very successful in taking on a national leadership role in that, and so I think it's a good idea. I think it would be good politically for her.

This is what Steve Fulop was trying to signal. His whole lane was, "I'm the one who's going to fight political corruption. I'm going to clean up this state. We're paying a corruption tax. It's too much, and we need to do better. I would stick with Matt Platkin." Mikie Sherrill could gain a lot by saying that she would keep him on.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks, John. Here's a couple of interesting texts. Listener writes, "I worked the polls in West Milford three early voting days, and yesterday the turnout was surprisingly high. You could see determined Democrats. Then another one writes, "Any thoughts on turnout in this primary? Looking quickly at 2021, Phil Murphy got 383,000 votes compared to over 785,000 Democratic voters yesterday."

Nancy Solomon: It's a great question. Yes, turnout was much, much higher than predicted. The numbers aren't in yet exactly, because the mail-in ballots are still going to be counted for another few days. Turnout was much higher, and I think some of that is the political moment that we're in. Some of that is vote by mail, which has just been a huge change. It makes it so much easier for people to vote. They get their ballot in the mail, you fill it out, you stick it back in the mail, you never have to leave the house. It gives you many weeks to do that. Then campaigns know who requested a mail-in ballot and hasn't mailed it back, and so the campaigns can contact voters.

Brian Lehrer: Oh, they have that?

Nancy Solomon: Yes, they have that. Now it is a full on, "Get out the vote," activity of campaigns, is to-- you identify who your voters are and if they haven't turned in their mail-in ballot yet, give them a call and ask them to do so. Turnout was much higher than predicted and much higher-- I heard last night on NJ PBS, the reporter saying that it was historically high for a primary.

Brian Lehrer: Wow. Really interesting. That might have national implications too, as we look toward the 2026 midterms. One more call. Mike in Trenton, you're on WNYC. Hi, Mike.

Mike: Oh, hi, Brian. Hey, I'll say two things. One, as a New Jersey voter, I'm really happy to see that we've got two really compelling candidates, impressive backgrounds, high integrity and you'd have to say, winning personalities.

I will say this to the point about the Trump issue in this election, Ciattarelli is so good on the issues and he's had a lot of experience in this space. He will be terrific on that point in debates. Mikie, I don't have enough experience with. I think she'll do fine, but Jack I think wins those. I'm a Democrat, by the way. I think it will be important for Sherrill to find that balance, avoiding the Kamala trap of, "She is not talking about policy, it's just about Trump." She's got to bring that in because she'll touch on the visceral reaction that so many people have to Trump and balance it with the policy stuff, or else policy to policy, she loses. I'm delighted, and this is going to be a good campaign.

Brian Lehrer: Mike, let me ask you what issues that Ciattarelli has pledged to do. What things has he pledged to do that you like?

Nancy Solomon: I think he's good on education. Some of his policies over the years on education funding are good. I think he will be a fiscally responsible governor. [unintelligible 00:31:53] where it starts in New Jersey, why anyone would want to be governor, given the fiscal cliffs that seem to still be awaiting, that Governor Murphy dodged, maybe largely due to the COVID funding. We need a good fiscal manager. I think most New Jersey feel that way and certainly property taxes play into that in a big way. Those would be the two biggest areas in my mind.

I think his embrace of Trump went much further than I would have expected, and maybe he needed to do that. That is something Sherrill needs to play up. One last point, Brian, on Ciattarelli's opener, is a good line to say, "You're going to hear Mikie Sherrill talk about Trump and if it's a drinking game, blah, blah, blah." I think Sherrill's got to be ready for that one. If I were her I'd say, "Well, why does Senator Jack want to run away from that issue now since he's made it such a prominent position already?" Anyway, thank you.

Brian Lehrer: Mike. Thank you. Call us again. All right. Here's one more clip of Ciattarelli from his victory speech last night, taking a cue from some of what Mike in Trenton was just talking about, and then we'll hear one more clip of Sherrill.

Republican Jack Ciattarelli: Make no mistake, a vote for Mikie Sherrill is a vote for four more years of Phil Murphy. Four more years of the highest taxes and billions in wasteful spending. Four more years of state-mandated affordable housing and overdeveloped suburbs. Four more years of offshore wind farms and rising electricity bills. Four more years of handcuffing our police, increasing crime, flash mobs and curfews along our Jersey shore. Guys, like all of you, I've had it. It's time for a change.

Congresswoman Mikie Sherrill: I am ready to shake up the status quo and Jack is the status quo. He's not change. He's a rerun. He's a ghost of elections past. I have fought for new opportunities my entire life, from my first oath to the Constitution as a teenager at the United States Naval Academy to this moment. I have always fought to upend unfair systems and I am now going to take on systems that don't work or only serve special interest in the only way I know how, by running to be your next governor.

[applause]

Brian Lehrer: We will let the candidates themselves there have the last word in this segment, except the words game on. We'll continue with Nancy in a minute on her new podcast. It's the saga of a certain other statewide politician, household name in New Jersey to be sure, who's about to spend time behind bars. Stay with us.

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC still with our Nancy Solomon. We turn the page on another major story coming out of Jersey. Former Senator Bob Menendez is scheduled to report to prison next Tuesday. Menendez was sentenced to 11 years for taking bribes, as most of you know, in cash and gold and acting as Egypt's foreign agent in Washington. WNYC is out with a new three-part series from Nancy tracking the politician's rise and fall. It's called Dead End: The Rise and Fall of Gold Bar Bob Menendez. The first of three episodes drops today.

We will play a clip in a minute, but Nancy, in the first episode you trace Menendez's childhood in a tough New Jersey neighborhood all the way to major political power player. You want to take us to the beginning and talk about his early life as a "overachieving son of working class Cuban immigrants," as you put it?

Nancy Solomon: Sure. He grew up in Union City, which was a Cuban enclave of Cuban immigrants who fled the revolution and emigrated to the United States. It was a somewhat tough childhood. He grew up in a small apartment. His mother was a seamstress. His father was a itinerant carpenter and mostly a gambler, and would later kill himself when Menendez was a young adult at that point.

He got into politics early. He tells a really sweet story of not being able to afford the books to be in the honors program in his high school. He fought that and fought that if you qualify for honors, you should be given the books. He ended up running for the school board. He's such an interesting character. This is the reason behind wanting to focus on him and tell this story is that, he was a heroic character in some ways.

Early on before he ran for office, he testified against a mob-connected party boss, had to wear a bulletproof vest to go into the courthouse. Over the many, many years he was in politics, he was a reliable progressive vote for the Democrats. This epic collapse of his career was just interesting to me to try to understand how and why.

Brian Lehrer: The podcast seeks to convey that the details of the case are both more serious and crazier than the news coverage even conveyed. Can you give us a bit of refresh on how and why more crazy?

Nancy Solomon: There was a lot of good coverage by the reporters who were covering the case, but I don't think the public really keyed into all the details and paid attention. What

Brian Lehrer: Crazy enough by the way.

Nancy Solomon: Crazy enough. The case is about, Bob and Nadine Menendez start dating. Nadine is friends-- She speaks several languages, including Arabic. She was born in Lebanon and is Armenian, of Armenian descent. Her family came to the United States and she was part of a social group in Bergen County of people who were also immigrants who spoke Arabic.

One of them is this guy, Wael Hana. She's broke, he's broke. He's trying to come up with a new business idea. He's got some Egyptian government connections, and so he wants to become a certifier of halal meat exports, which all meat going from anywhere in the world to Egypt have to be certified as halal, which is kosher, but halal. That's what he's working on, but he's not getting any traction. He's yet to get this contract, any contract, and be able to make any money from it.

She starts dating Bob Menendez and they hatch this plot of, "Oh, I need help with the Egyptians, and you're on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee." Ultimately, what happens is that Bob Menendez meets with Egyptian officials, with Egyptian intelligence as the ranking member or the chair, depending on what year we're in. He's in the leadership of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and they control Egypt's military aid.

Basically what you have is a three-way deal where Egypt gets help from Bob Menendez so that a human rights hold on some of their Military aid is released. Egypt controls who gets to certify halal meat coming into their country, and instead of the four American companies that were doing it, they pick this guy, Wael Hana, who had never done anything about meat certification in his past or butchering or anything like that, or meat exports.

They give him a monopoly, they get rid of all the four others, he raises the prices, he makes a ton of money. He and a business partner who also is having some legal trouble, a guy from Edgewater, New Jersey, a developer, they start giving the Menendez's money and gold bars.

Brian Lehrer: That's a good setup for the one clip that we're going to play now, a free sample, listeners, of the free podcast. The whole series is free, but here's your free sample from Episode 2, which is called The Lover. Just as Menendez walks free from his first corruption trial in 2015, he meets his new love, Nadine Arslanian. Back then, she was a stay-at-home mom in Englewood. In that episode, Nancy talks about how, within weeks of them meeting, Nadine was arranging these meetings with Egyptian generals. What we have here is a voicemail, 25 seconds of a voicemail, from Nadine to Bob Menendez featured in that episode.

Nadine Menendez: Hi, it's me calling my very handsome face senator. I have a favor to ask you. Hopefully you could do it, but just got off with the general. Since he has not met you before, he needs to have some kind of clearance from Egypt as to why he's meeting a US Senator out of the embassy.

Brian Lehrer: I think that was clear enough for people to hear that voicemail, starting with, "It's me calling my very handsome senator, I have a favor to ask," and then she asks the favor. Anything to say about that particular clip?

Nancy Solomon: Besides, it's my single most favorite piece of tape in the whole podcast? This goes back to the setup for our conversation about, this really was more surprising and crazy than even what we were reading in the papers. What really surprised me is the timeline. That voicemail is at the end of February of 2018. Bob and Nadine Menendez went out on their first date on February 2nd of 2018. The reason I know this is because what was entered into court is a enormous treasure trove of texts and voicemails through this whole episode. Not the podcast episode, but the episode in their lives.

We're talking three weeks from their first date to when Nadine Arslanian, not the staff of Bob Menendez, not the State Department, not people at the embassy, but Nadine is arranging a meeting with an Egyptian general who actually, it turns out he's in charge of- he's based in Washington and he's the defense attaché, he's in charge of military aid between the United States and Egypt. Egypt, by the way, is the second largest recipient of US military aid. It was just crazy to me how quick that happened. Three weeks and Bob Menendez is making plans for an off-the-books meeting with an Egyptian general. That blew me away.

Brian Lehrer: Folks, Episode 1 of Dead End: The Rise and Fall of Gold Bar Bob Menendez, is out today with the additional episodes dropping on Friday and then next Tuesday. Nancy, thanks for everything today, including the first segment breaking down the gubernatorial primary results from last night, and congrats on this great podcast.

Nancy Solomon: Thanks, Brian. Happy to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Much more to come.

 

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