Analysts: Menendez maintains edge despite ethics censure

WASHINGTON» New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez seems in good shape to win a third term despite a harsh rebuke from fellow senators who say he violated chamber rules and federal law, according to political analysts and party colleagues.

The Senate ethics committee found that Menendez repeatedly accepted gifts of significant value, failed to report them and advanced the personal and business interests of the donor who provided the gifts.

The allegations were hardly new to most New Jersey voters. Menendez’s federal bribery trial last fall centered on those same accusations. It ended with a hung jury; prosecutors decided not to retry the case.

Whatever negatives were generated from the trial appear to be more than offset by the fact he has a “D’‘ next to his name in the Democratic stronghold, said Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute in New Jersey.

Monmouth’s polling this month showed Menendez with a 53 to 32 percent advantage over his likely Republican challenger in November, former Celgene executive Bob Hugin.

“They’re not happy with his behavior, but they seem to be willing to overlook it,” Murray said of New Jersey’s voters.

A poll from Quinnipiac University released in March showed a similar result, 49 percent for Menendez and 32 percent for Hugin.

The Senate committee’s findings certainly won’t help Menendez, Murray said, but “he has a long runway to put this behind him as long as no new allegations come out.”

There are, however, warning signs.

Menendez, 64, seems to be hovering around 50 percent in his head-to-head matchups with Hugin, even with the vast majority of voters not having enough information to form an opinion of the Republican.

Hugin, with much money at his disposal, could persuade most of those undecided voters to move his way. Hugin has lent his campaign $7.5 million so far and has said he’s willing to add substantially to that.

National Republicans also note from the Quinnipiac poll that 38 percent of New Jersey voters believe Menendez was involved in serious wrongdoing, about double those who believed he was not. The remainder said they didn’t have enough information to draw a conclusion.

“I think it’s going to be a closer race than most observers think it’s going to be simply because of how unpopular Bob Menendez is,” said Bob Salera, a spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee.