US senator Robert Menendez denies sex with under-age prostitutes Senator Robert Menendez, the incoming chairman of the Senate's influential foreign relations committee, issued the unusual statement amid growing controversy over the donor, Dr Salomon Melgen. Two women from the Dominican Republic claimed in The Daily Caller, a news website, that they were paid for sex with Mr Menendez, a 58-year-old divorcee, last year at the Casa de Campo resort. "He called himself 'Bob'," one of the women told the website. Dr Melgen, an eye specialist and friend of the senator, owns a property in the 7,000-acre resort, at which Mr Menendez is reported to have stayed. The doctor's clinic, in West Palm Beach, Florida, was this week raided by the FBI. Its agents are believed to be investigating potential fraud relating to Medicare, the health scheme for poor Americans. While strenuously denying liaisons with prostitutes, Mr Menendez's office said he had reimbursed Mr Melgen for two trips to the Dominican Republic on the doctor's private jet in 2010. Aides to the senator, a leading advocate for US victims of the Lockerbie bombing, said he had repaid Mr Melgen $58,500 (£37,000) for the trips, which had not previously been disclosed publicly. Mr Menendez this week took over the foreign relations committee chairmanship from Senator John Kerry, who was confirmed as President Barack Obama's new Secretary of State.