the johnson amendment and you know, that there were all these rumors about how that they couldn t wait to get out there and let loose religious freedoms which really to so many of us feel end up feeling like you know, a cheer for discrimination. that troubles me more than the arnold schwarzenegger joke. maybe you don t follow some of the stories that follow around the country but i know personally several pastors who have had their sermon notes subpoenaed. a doctor down in georgia recently, dr. eric walsh, was actually fired from his job because the government took his sermons, scrutinized them and because he professed some traditional views fired him from his job and laughed about it on his voicemail. these things happen. it s not discrimination. it s people having freedom of speech and for donald trump to point that out it was a welcome breath of fresh air to many of us. is this happening on a mass level? it s happening all across the country in several states. there are mass
charges, criminal corruption charges, against senator bob menendez of new jersey. this is a democratic senator who has been under fire for a number of years now. the justice department had been investigating the senator for various issues but the focus of this of the charges, we expect will be his relationship with a prominent democratic donor who is a doctor down in south florida. here s a comment from the senator s office. we expect to hear from senator menendez on this later on today but for now, here s what he had to say, according to his office. we believe all of the senator s actions have been appropriate and lawful and the facts will ultimately confirm that. wolf this is going to be a tough case you know, for the justice department. he has been somebody that has been in their sights for a long long time and it s not going to be easy because a sitting senator has a lot of constitutional protections and we expect that he s going to use all of those.
welcome back to the lead. i m jake tapper. some breaking news in our politics lead. a top senate democrat expected to face federal corruption charges. cnn first to report the justice department is preparing to seek an indictment against new jersey democratic senator robert menendez. let s go to cnn s evan perez who broke the story and has the details. evan what do prosecutors allege this democratic powerhouse did? well jake he had this very apparently lucrative relationship with a friend and prominent democratic donor, solomon melgin a doctor down in florida who has had many many issues with the federal government including being accused of defrauding medicare and according to the justice department according to prosecutors investigating this for nearly five years, he was using his office the senator was using his office to try to
bill: they re both 16 years old. there is all in one school. a lot of talk this is facebook. they re all in the same school. they all knew about it. it all spread. probably a couple target cases started it and that were real. we don t know yet but i want to get to the bottom of it. you referred to social media because some doctor or specialist this week who referenced the possibility that the internet is driving this and you discount that. by the way that specialist has not seen or even met these young ladies but you have a new bit of information this morning about the story. there is a doctor down in new jersey and he may have even been prompted by an interview i did with martha where we talked about the possibility this could be a pediatric autoimmune syndrome. there could be environmental trigger. erin brockovich has been trying to investigate that issue. this doctor in new jersey, has seen nine of the children and two of the ones i interviewed have seen him. a lot of kids are