Big Qatari Payday for Menendez Pal Tied to Probe

Embattled Sen. Bob Menendez has a go-to defense whenever he’s questioned about a federal investigation into his ties to a firm that secured a mysterious monopoly on the Egyptian meat supply—his historically hostile posture toward the regime in Cairo.

But The Daily Beast has discovered that a Menendez-backing businessman who lawyered up to deal with the probe sealed a $45 million deal with royalty from a country the New Jersey Democrat has smiled upon from his perch atop Foreign Relations Committee: Qatar.

The 30-year Capitol Hill veteran trotted out his preferred retort about the legal scrutiny on CNN earlier this month, when host Poppy Harlow pressed him about the new defense fund he set up to pay lawyers fending off the investigation.

Read more at The Daily Beast.