New Jersey's former top law enforcement leader took the stand today at Senator Bob menendez's Federal corruption trial former Attorney General Gurbir Grewal testified about phone calls and a meeting he took with the senior senator back in 2019 in which prosecutors alleged Menendez tried to interfere with an insurance fraud case involving Jose Uribe he's one of the three businessmen indicted in the bribery scheme Uribe pleaded guilty and is expected to be a star witness for the prosecution.

Grewal is the most prominent official to testify against Menendez so far today he offered key details about the direct conversations they had and what exactly the senator asked from him senior correspondent Brenda Flanagan has been in the Manhattan courtroom for us all day and joins us live with the latest Brenda what can you tell us well Brianna we got some very eye-opening testimony today from former New Jersey attorney general Gurbir Grewal he testified that he twice refused to discuss a specific criminal fraud case at the request of Senator Bob Menendez he says Menendez asked him twice in a phone call and also in a face-to-face meeting the prosecution says that they're trying to prove that Menendez was using his political influence to help friends of menendez's then girlfriend naen and that they were essentially trying to interf fear with a prosecution a case out of the AG's office that was looking into insurance fraud in the trucking industry in New Jersey and this was at a request of Jose Uribe Brianna so Brenda how exactly did Menendez pose this question did it give grounds for a quid proquo well he was asked if there was a specific request and Grewal said quote there was not an explicit ask but he did say that Menendez told him he was concerned about how Hispanics versus non-hispanic defendants were being treated by the prosecutors in the Attorney General's office who are investigating cases in the trucking industry and Grewal asked well is this about a specific case and Menendez said well yes it is that's when Grewal shut it down and he told Menendez I can't talk to you about this and he advised Menendez to essentially let the defense attorneys in the case handle it but that he wasn't going to talk about it Brianna did did Grewal though ever relay that information to any of his staff uh he said no he didn't he had a policy that he was not going to ever mention this to his team he said he needed to insulate them from any kind of outside influence and that he made it a point not to ask them he said when he refused Menendez that the senator took it calmly and said absolutely nothing about it I'm guessing bran that the defense got an opportunity for cross examination today how did they play this well the defense argued that Menendez was not really in any position uh to do anything for grey wall or and so there really wasn't evidence of a of a quid pro quo but let's talk about what happened after this case uh the fraud case at at Point ended in a plea deal um and it was obvious According to some text messages that Jose Uribe realized and knew that Menendez was at least reaching out meeting hold you know trying to to make some no I don't want to use the word interference but influence in in the case uh now just uh as a matter of coincidence according to the prosecution not coincidence Jose Uribe uh financed a brand new $60,000 Mercedes Benz for Nadine Menendez uh and that's the quid pro quo uh according to the prosecution now here's where it gets very interesting because Jose Uribe uh who was a codefendant in this case and pleaded guilty he flipped he pleaded guilty and now he's going to testify and he's going to tell the jury it was indeed a quid pro quo this was a bribe Briana Hey Bren very quickly did Menendez and Grewal exchange any words when he entered the court and of course the two served for a long time in state and you know Federal capacities if they locked eyes I didn't see it and I didn't see them speak a word to each other a cold courtroom a rainy day Brenda Flanagan for us in Manhattan Bren thanks so much you're welcome [Music]