Federal bribery charges filed against Texas Democratic congressman and his wife

WASHINGTON – The Justice Department on Friday charged Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, and his wife with taking foreign bribes and money laundering.

Both Cuellar and his wife, Imelda, are accused of taking roughly $600,000 from an oil and gas company tied to the Azerbaijan government and a bank headquartered in Mexico City. The indictment accuses Cuellar of corruptly trying to influence U.S. foreign policy in favor of Azerbaijan and using his legislative clout to benefit the bank.

The payments allegedly began in at least December 2014 and continued through at least November 2021. Cuellar previously served as co-chair of the Congressional Azerbaijan Caucus.

The bribes, according to the indictment, were laundered through shell companies owned by Imelda Cuellar. Both Cuellars have been slapped with charges related to bribery, wire fraud, money laundering and acting as foreign agents. The charges together carry decades of prison if they are convicted.

The FBI searched Cuellar's home and campaign office in 2022 as part of a federal probe into Azerbaijan. NBC News first reported the indictment.

According to the Justice Department, Cuellar and his wife made an initial court appearance on Friday before a U.S. magistrate judge in Houston. In a statement released before the indictment was unsealed, the 10-term congressman denied wrongdoing.

“I want to be clear that both my wife and I are innocent of these allegations,” Cuellar said, adding he had “proactively sought legal advice from the House Ethics Committee, who gave me more than one written opinion, along with an additional opinion from a national law firm.”

“Furthermore, we requested a meeting with the Washington D.C. prosecutors to explain the facts and they refused to discuss the case with us or to hear our side,” Cuellar continued.

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Cuellar in his statement said that he still intends to run for reelection in November.

Christie Stephenson, a spokesperson for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said in a statement that Cuellar "has admirably devoted his career to public service and is a valued Member of the House Democratic Caucus," adding that Cuellar "is entitled to his day in court and the presumption of innocence throughout the legal process."

Cuellar will step down as the top Democrat on the House Appropriations subcommittee tasked with funding the Department of Homeland Security, Stephenson said.

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Cuellar is one of the most conservative congressional Democrats and has often drawn the ire of his colleagues for his opposition to abortion. He beat back a progressive primary challenger in 2022 but ran unopposed this year.

The National Republican Congressional Committee, the campaign arm of House Republicans, swiftly pounced on word of the indictment and urged House Democrats to call on their colleague to resign.

“Henry Cuellar does not put Texas first, he puts himself first,” Delanie Bomar, a spokesperson for the NRCC said in a statement. “If his colleagues truly believe in putting ‘people over politics,’ they will call on him to resign. If not – they are hypocrites whose statements about public service aren’t worth the paper they’re written on.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Texas Democratic House member and wife charged in bribery scheme