RUBEN NAVARRETTE JR.: Menendez indictment isn’t about race. It’s about right and wrong.

On the subject of whom politicians really serve, Robin Williams was right on the money. The late actor and comedian once suggested that members of Congress ought to be “like NASCAR drivers” and wear jackets bearing “the names of all the people who are sponsoring them.”

They’re going to need bigger jackets.

Apparently, Sen. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., owns a navy-blue windbreaker worn by members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. Federal agents say they found wads of cash stuffed into the pockets of that jacket and other clothing in the home Menendez shares with his wife, Nadine.

The couple were recently indicted by a federal grand jury, with prosecutors alleging that they took lavish bribes from three New Jersey businessmen in exchange for Sen. Menendez performing official acts. The businessmen have also been charged.

As chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Menendez influences military sales and foreign aid. According to the indictment, the couple took hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes in return for the senator helping the government of Egypt.

Prosecutors also allege that federal agents uncovered more than $480,000 in cash during a search of the couple’s home in June 2022, “much of it stuffed into envelopes and hidden in clothing, closets, and a safe.” They allegedly found more than $70,000 in a safe-deposit box belonging to Nadine Menendez, gold bars worth more than $100,000 and a Mercedes that was a gift from one of their co-defendants.

Under our system, everyone is innocent until proven guilty. But, as my Mexican-born wife says: “Cuando el rio suena es porque agua lleva.” When you hear the river crackling, it’s because it’s full of water.

The part about “official acts” is key. According to experts on federal anti-corruption laws, it’s not enough for an elected official to engage in unseemly behavior. The federal prisons would be full.

If an elected official takes money from a wealthy donor and makes a phone call on their behalf, that’s OK. But if that same official alters his official acts by changing his vote on a bill, or steering a committee that he sits on in one direction or another, that’s not OK.

Menendez and his wife entered pleas of “not guilty” last week when they appeared in federal court in Manhattan.

In 2015, the senator was charged by federal prosecutors in an 18-count indictment alleging corruption and bribery in cahoots with a Miami-area doctor. Menendez’s lawyers offered a novel defense at his 2017 trial: “friendship.” There was no quid pro quo, they claimed. Just two pals doing each other favors. At least one jury member bought the argument, and the judge declared a mistrial.

Now Uncle Sam’s lawyers want another crack at the piñata.

Menendez is blaming the indictment on racism, insisting that he has been singled out as a high-profile Latino.

Come again? As a Latino myself, I had no idea this guy was a member of the club. The senator often acts as a Democrat first and a Latino second.

Menendez also says he hoarded cash from his personal savings at home because his parents, who were born in Cuba, taught him about the risk of the government seizing your assets from a bank.

My Cuban American friends — including some who lean toward the Democratic Party — were furious that the senator played what I would call “the Fidel card.”

If you thought this Latino columnist would make excuses for a Latino senator, then you don’t know this columnist very well.

I have no patience for smug elites with their overinflated sense of self-worth who are often wrong but never in doubt. They think they’re smarter than everyone else, but the fact that they breathe rarefied air has left them clueless about their own people — especially the concerns of the working class. Menendez has been cashing government checks since he was first elected mayor of Union City, N.J., in 1986. I’ve been following his career since he arrived in the Senate in 2006. He takes care of the interests that take care of him. Yet I’ve never felt that his interests and the interests of Latinos were aligned.

Not that racism isn’t real. You had better believe it is. And it’s why Latinos who become rich and successful are always suspected of having done something shady. So it’s important that high-achievers remain above reproach.

Honestly, if Menendez hadn’t completely lost touch with what it means to be Latino, I wouldn’t have to explain all this to him.

Ruben Navarrette’s email address is crimscribe@icloud.com. His podcast, “Ruben in the Center,” is available through every podcast app.