Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) was convicted last month on federal criminal charges for accepting bribes from businessmen friends in exchange for political favors and acting as a foreign agent on behalf of the government of Egypt.

On Tuesday, after facing unrelenting public pressure, dismal polling, and abandonment by his colleagues, Menendez formally resigned his seat in the U.S. Senate, according to the Associated Press.

That resignation came less than a week after Menendez, who'd launched an independent campaign for re-election to a fourth term, formally ended that long-shot bid and had his name removed from New Jersey's ballots.

Resigned in disgrace

The now-former Sen. Menendez was federally indicted last year in a sprawling corruption case that accused him of accepting bribes, including gold bars, cash, and other items of tangible value for his wife, in exchange for using his political influence to provide favors for friends, including meddling in criminal investigations and government contracts.

He was also accused of accepting bribes in exchange for providing information to and using his influence to benefit the Egyptian government, and was convicted on all charges by a jury last month -- a conviction he plans to appeal.

In the meantime, however, after having staunchly resisted for months the mounting calls from the public and even his Democratic friends and colleagues to step aside, Menendez finally notified Democratic New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy of his intent to resign on Tuesday.

For his part, Murphy had already announced over the weekend that he would appoint a former top aide, former Chief of Staff George Helmy, to temporarily fill the outgoing senator's seat until the winner of November's election is certified. Helmy has some familiarity with the U.S. Senate as he previously served as state director for New Jersey's other Democratic senator, Cory Booker.

Removed his name from the ballot as an independent candidate

It was just a few days earlier on Friday, according to The Hill, that Menendez had sent a letter to the New Jersey Division of Elections with a formal request to remove his name from the state's ballots ahead of November's elections -- the last day he could do so before the ballots were finalized and printing began.

Given his terrible polling numbers, Menendez skipped the Democratic primary and instead mounted an independent campaign for another six-year term in the Senate, but that unlikely bid is now officially over.

Thus, New Jersey voters will now decide between Rep. Andy Kim (D-NJ) and Republican businessman Curtis Bashaw to fill the open Senate seat, with Kim heavily favored to win in the Democrat-dominated state.

A 50-year career in politics now over

According to the New Jersey Globe, Menendez's resignation on Tuesday ended a 50-year career in politics that began when, while still a teenage college student, he won an election for a local school board seat in 1974.

Over the decades, he would go on to serve as mayor of Union City and in the state Assembly and state Senate until he was elected to Congress in 1992, where he was repeatedly re-elected until 2006, when he was first appointed and then ran to fill the U.S. Senate seat previously occupied by then-Gov. Jon Corzine.

During his three terms in the Senate, Menendez rose in power and influence as the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee -- which, according to federal prosecutors, he exploited to provide political favors in exchange for bribes.

He briefly stepped down from that chairmanship per Democratic committee rules in 2015 when he was indicted the first time on corruption charges but later reclaimed it after the case ended in a 2017 mistrial and prosecutors opted to not retry him.