January 10, 2009
Illinois House Impeaches Governor
By SUSAN SAULNY and LIZ ROBBINS, NY TIMES

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. — The Illinois House of Representatives voted overwhelmingly to impeach Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich on Friday, setting the stage for a trial in the State Senate, where lawmakers will have the difficult task of separating the political theatrics of the governor’s problems from the legal issues.

Mr. Blagojevich, a Democrat, is the first governor in Illinois history to be impeached.

The House deliberated less than an hour and a half before voting 114 to 1 to oust the governor, just one day after a 21-member House investigative committee unanimously recommended impeachment.

“This governor has violated his oath of office,” Representative Barbara Flynn Currie, a Democrat who was chairwoman of the committee, told lawmakers. “This governor has breached the public trust. And this governor must be impeached.”

Mr. Blagojevich, who was jogging in the snow near his home while the House was meeting, responded at an afternoon news conference in Chicago.

“The House’s action today was of course not a surprise, it was a foregone conclusion,” Mr. Blagojevich said. “What the House did today, they’ve been talking about the last couple of years.”

The governor spent the rest of the news conference attacking House members, saying they had thwarted his efforts to expand health care in the state. To tout his accomplishments in that area, he brought to the dais with him a dozen Illinois residents whom he said he had helped get health care. They included a man in a wheelchair wearing a neck brace and two toddlers who were crying in the background throughout the proceedings.

Mr. Blagojevich said that his actions to “save lives” were not “impeachable offenses,” and that he would continue to “fight for the people of Illinois.”

He added, “I am confident that at the end of the day I will be properly exonerated.”

Mr. Blagojevich did not take questions, walking out after quoting the British poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, and saying, “I’ll see you soon.”

Lieutenant Governor Pat Quinn held his own news conference 10 minutes later, saying he wished Mr. Blagojevich would have resigned today and asserting that with all the talk about health care, the governor had avoided the larger issue.

“The governor did not address the central issue, which is the abuse of power,” Mr. Quinn said. “That is really the essence of the charges against him and he’ll have to address them in the Illinois Senate.”

Earlier in Springfield, legislators spent Friday morning discussing the merits of the case against Mr. Blagojevich, who has been embroiled in a sprawling legal and political drama since his arrest on Dec. 9 on federal corruption charges, including accusations that he schemed to trade the United States Senate seat formerly held by President-elect Barack Obama for personal favors.

The governor has vehemently denied those accusations and defied those who have called for his resignation by appointing Roland W. Burris to fill Mr. Obama’s seat.

Democratic leaders in the Senate had blocked Mr. Burris from taking his seat this week because the Illinois secretary of state had not signed his letter of appointment from the governor. On Friday, after the impeachment vote, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled that the signature was unnecessary, which led Senator Richard J. Durban of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat in the Senate, to insist that Mr. Burris would not be Mr. Obama’s replacement without the signature.

A short time later, the secretary of state, Jesse White, compromised and signed a separate document with the state seal, and Senate Democratic officials then indicated that would probably result in recognition of Mr. Burris as the state’s junior senator.

During the brief impeachment deliberation, which played out before a packed public gallery, the room was so chatty with buzz that at one point Michael J. Madigan, the speaker of the House, had to call for order, asking the members to tone down their private conversations.

“My heart is heavy but my responsibility is clear,” Representative Currie told the lawmakers. “This governor tramples on the legislative process.” Representative Jack D. Franks, a Democrat who was also on the panel, added, “It’s our duty to clean up this mess and stop the freak show that has become government in Illinois.”

“I believe we’re finally doing what we should have done a long time ago,” Mr. Franks said later during the deliberations. “We’re doing the right thing. I know it’s hard. It’s unprecedented. It’s uncharted territory. But I can’t think of a more important thing we’ve done in this body.”

Only Representative Milton Patterson, a Democrat from Chicago, voted against the impeachment, and no one defended Mr. Blagojevich in the speedy conclusion to the House’s role in the impeachment proceedings. In a statement Friday afternoon, Mr. Patterson said, “I did not feel like I had enough information based on the report to make an informed decision to remove the governor from office.”

As a formality, when the new Illinois General Assembly is sworn in next Wednesday, it must vote again before sending the impeachment resolution to the Senate.

For the governor to be removed from office, a two-thirds majority of the Senate — 40 of the 59 members — must vote to convict him. It is unclear when the Senate will take up the matter.

Although lawmakers had been calling for Mr. Blagojevich’s impeachment since his arrest last month, the formal proceedings in the House were brief. The Senate trial, though, could be more protracted.

“We should not be removing governors simply because the legislature doesn’t like what they do,” said Jeffrey Shaman, a professor at DePaul College of Law and an expert on state constitutional law. “There has to be a serious abuse of power before the governor may be removed.”

The last United States governor to be impeached was Evan Mecham of Arizona, who was removed from office in 1988 after serving 15 months, but was later acquitted in his criminal trial.

The case against Mr. Blagojevich stemmed not only from the charges involving Mr. Obama’s former Senate seat, but also from accusations of pay-to-play corruption in state government, including that he threatened to withdraw $8 million in money to a children’s hospital in exchange for a $50,000 political contribution, that he extorted the Chicago Tribune, and that he expanded a state health care program without the state legislature’s approval.

The case against Mr. Blagojevich is outlined in 13 points in the article of impeachment the House prepared to send to the Senate.

“Taken together with the items detailed in the criminal complaint, the totality of all of that” reaches the level of impeachment, said Ms. Currie, who is also the majority leader of the House.

Representative Susana Mendoza, another committee member, said: “Rod Blagojevich: you should be ashamed of yourself. Take your sullied place in history.”

Susan Saulny reported from Springfield, Ill., Monica Davey from Chicago, and Liz Robbins from New York.

Final Report of the Special Investigative Committee

Illinois House Impeaches Governor
By DOUGLAS BELKIN in Springfield, Ill., and DAVID KESMODEL in Chicago
LINK

The Illinois House of Representatives voted Friday to impeach Gov. Rod Blagojevich, setting the stage for a trial in the state Senate after the governor's arrest on federal corruption charges.

The 114-to-1 House vote was the latest turn in a political drama that began with the arrest of Mr. Blagojevich last month and has since cast a shadow over the home state of President-elect Barack Obama.

After the vote by state lawmakers, Gov. Blagojevich told a news conference: "I am not guilty of any criminal wrongdoing. I believe that at the end of the day I will be properly exonerated."
At a rally outside the offices of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, protestors called for his resignation. A Senate trial could lead to his removal from office after the House voted 114 to 1 to impeach him.

More
* Video: Burris Testifies Before Committee
* Video: House Votes to Impeach Blagojevich
* Complete Coverage: Rod Blagojevich

Three Illinois governors have served prison time, but Friday's vote marked the first impeachment of a governor in the state's 190-year history. During a 90-minute session, state lawmakers from both parties heaped scorn on Mr. Blagojevich, a two-term Democrat.

"He has violated the constitution, he has violated the laws of this state," said Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, who served as chairwoman of a 21-member committee that recommended impeachment. "The totality of the evidence shows he has forfeited the right to hold office."

Nine state senators met Friday to hash out rules for the state Senate trial, which is expected to begin Jan. 26. A state Supreme Court justice will preside and the House will appoint a special prosecutor. Forty of the Senate's 59 members must find Mr. Blagojevich guilty to force him from office.

Federal prosecutors allege Mr. Blagojevich extracted money and favors in exchange for gubernatorial support. They also have accused him of conspiring to sell the Senate seat left vacant by Mr. Obama, a plot allegedly captured in secretly recorded telephone conversations in the fall.

After his arrest, Mr. Blagojevich last month named former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris to fill the seat, triggering a political fight with U.S. Senate Democrats, Mr. Obama and the Illinois secretary of state, who refused to sign the appointment papers. None alleged wrongdoing by Mr. Burris but said the accusations against Mr. Blagojevich tainted any appointment.

The Illinois Supreme Court ruled Friday that the secretary of state wasn't obligated to certify the governor's appointment of Mr. Burris, clearing one bureaucratic hurdle.

Democratic leaders, after refusing Mr. Burris from the Senate swearing-in ceremony Tuesday, turned conciliatory a day later. Mr. Burris met Wednesday with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who afterward appeared to clear the way for him to be seated.

In a statement Friday, Mr. Burris said: "I am very happy that the Supreme Court ruled supporting our argument that everything surrounding this appointment was legal and complete." He told a state House special investigations committee Thursday that he made no deal with the governor to win the appointment.

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich appears with supporters after lawmakers' 114-1 vote, the first impeachment of a governor in the state's history.

State Attorney General Lisa Madigan said Friday the appointment is now valid and urged the Senate to seat Mr. Burris.

But Sen. Dick Durbin on Friday urged delaying Mr. Burris's appointment until completion of the state Senate trial. "We've clearly reached an impasse," he said.

Mr. Durbin said U.S. Senate rules dating to 1884 require the signatures of both the governor and secretary of state to fill Senate vacancies.

Late Friday, lawyers for Mr. Burris said that they had filed new paperwork to the Senate and may file suit in federal court if the Senate doesn't seat the appointee.

Also, a spokesman for Sen. Reid issued a statement saying, "the Senate parliamentarian, the secretary of the Senate and Senate legal counsel are advising Senate leadership as we consider a way forward."

Mr. Blagojevich, a 52-year-old former boxer now in his second term as governor, staged a bit of drama at his Friday news conference. He brought with him a group of people he said had benefited from state health-care programs he had championed. He framed impeachment proceedings as a political vendetta by state lawmakers who have stood in the way of progressive legislation.

After naming each of the state programs, as well as the people whose lives he said the programs had saved, he asked rhetorically: "Is that an impeachable offense?"

Echoing an earlier appearance in which he quoted Rudyard Kipling, Mr. Blagojevich closed Friday's news conference by promising to continue to fight, and with a quote from Lord Alfred Tennyson's poem "Ulysses": "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

Write to Douglas Belkin at doug.belkin@wsj.com and David Kesmodel at david.kesmodel@wsj.com

Blagojevich impeached
Roland Burris asked ex-Rod Blagojevich aide about Senate seat
Governor's pick to fill Barack Obama vacancy testifies at impeachment panel
By Ray Long and Ashley Rueff, Chicago Tribune, January 9, 2009

SPRINGFIELD — Even as he sought to allay concerns about how Gov. Rod Blagojevich picked him for the U.S. Senate, Roland Burris disclosed Thursday he relayed his interest in the job to one of the governor's lobbyist fundraising friends whose activities are under federal scrutiny.

The former Illinois attorney general said he raised the idea of going to Washington if Barack Obama was elected president in a July or September conversation with Lon Monk, the Democratic governor's former chief of staff. Burris said he mentioned it as he was asking Monk to steer him lobbying clients.

The revelation didn't seem to hurt Burris—Illinois Democratic House Speaker Michael Madigan predicted Burris would be the state's next U.S. senator—but it served as another example of the intersection between Burris, Blagojevich and the governor's inner circle. Burris is touting his clean record of public service as a reason the U.S. Senate should seat him despite Democratic leadership's criticism that anyone Blagojevich picked would be tainted following the governor's arrest last month on federal corruption charges.

Burris told lawmakers on an Illinois House impeachment panel that he got a "surprise" offer of Obama's old Senate seat from Blagojevich just days after Christmas after one of the governor's lawyers had approached him about the possibility.

The explanation came in the middle of a nearly 90-minute questioning where Burris told lawmakers he cut no deals with Blagojevich and heard no offers of a quid pro quo.

"Absolutely, positively not," Burris said.

The appearance was one that Burris said top Democrats in Washington mandated as a condition of being accepted into the Senate. The response in Washington to Burris' performance was non-committal, however.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and his top deputy, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), said they will review Burris' testimony and discuss how to move forward.

Durbin said he was traveling back to Illinois as Burris spoke and wants to read the transcript. Durbin noted Burris' testimony was one of "two critical elements" for Burris to resolve as he tries to gain entry to the Senate. The other is still hanging before the Illinois Supreme Court, which is being asked by Burris to force Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White to sign his appointment paperwork.

Burris, meanwhile, offered a rave review of his testimony.

"I feel I passed the test with flying colors," Burris said afterward. "I have nothing to hide."

Yet it is Burris' conversation with Monk that takes on an added dimension as the Blagojevich case plays out in federal court. U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald asked a federal judge to allow the impeachment panel to hear covert FBI recordings in which Blagojevich and Monk allegedly discussed how the governor would sign horse-racing legislation in exchange for campaign contributions.

The panel pressed on and unanimously voted to recommend Blagojevich's impeachment to the full House without hearing those tapes after a judge gave lawyers for the governor and others until Jan. 23 to file in writing their objections to making the tapes public.

Under questioning by state Rep. Jim Durkin (R- Western Springs), Burris said he mentioned his interest in the Senate seat when he asked Monk to send him lobbying business. Burris thought Monk, who had recently left Blagojevich's office, might have a conflict of interest with some of his potential clients.

Pressed further after the hearing, Burris explained the move as that of a "sharp businessman."

But Burris, a campaign contributor who also threw a 2006 re-election fundraiser for Blagojevich, said he had "no idea" whether Monk ever relayed the message. Burris told the Tribune that he got no lobbying business from Monk, and Monk's attorney declined to comment.

Also Thursday, a close confidant of Burris confirmed he called another top Blagojevich staffer, John Filan, to recommend Burris' nephew for a state job. Fred Lebed, Burris' partner, called on behalf of Steven Burris, who had applied for a job as a chief financial officer with the Illinois Historical Preservation Agency.

Lebed said later, the governor's co-defendant and former chief of staff, John Harris, approved hiring Steven Burris. But Burris never started at the agency that had cut 32 jobs.

Tribune reporters John Chase and Mike Dorning contributed to this report.

Blagojevich's lawyer resigns

Breaking News! Copy of Supreme Court Of Illinois Decision Holding Governor's Appointment of Burris To Senate Was Lawful; Nevertheless, This Does Not Necessarily Get Burris Seated
LINK

Burris v. White, ___N.E.2d___(Ill. Jan. 9, 2009) is a critically important constitutional law decision. In a 10 page decision the Court holds that the Governor's appointment of Burris to Obama's Senate seat was lawful. As the Court explained:

Because the Secretary of State had no duty under section 5(1) of the Secretary of State Act (15 ILCS 305/5(1) (West 2006)) to sign and affix the state seal to the document issued by the Governor appointing Roland Burris to the United States Senate, Petitioners are not entitled to an order from this court requiring the Secretary to perform those Acts. Under the Secretary of State Act, the Secretary’s sole responsibility was to register the appointment (15 ILCS 305/5(2) (West 2006)), which he did. No further action is required by the Secretary of State or any other official to make the Governor’s appointment of Roland Burris to the United States Senate valid under Illinois law. Moreover, to the extent that additional proof of the validity of the appointment is necessary, Illinois law provides a mechanism for obtaining it without the need for judicial intervention.

As this decision rested on an interpretation of state law, the state Supreme Court decision is final on this point. However, the decision does not address whether under the U.S. Constitution and Senate rules, the Senate can refuse to seat Burris. That involves a question of federal law where the Supreme Court has final authority.
Interestingly, final briefs were filed on Jan. 7th and the decision came down on the 9th. Its amazing how quickly courts can act when the need to.

Mitchell H. Rubinstein

December 15, 2008
Two Sides of a Troubled Governor, Sinking Deeper
By MONICA DAVEY, NY TIMES

CHICAGO — Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich is a polished speaker who can win over elderly women at luncheons in southern Illinois with his earnest attention and eloquently recite historical anecdotes from the lives of the leaders he says he most admires — Theodore Roosevelt, Abraham Lincoln, Robert F. Kennedy, Alexander Hamilton, Ronald Reagan.

And yet, Mr. Blagojevich, 52, rarely turns up for work at his official state office in Chicago, former employees say, is unapologetically late to almost everything, and can treat employees with disdain, cursing and erupting in fury for failings as mundane as neglecting to have at hand at all times his preferred black Paul Mitchell hairbrush. He calls the brush “the football,” an allusion to the “nuclear football,” or the bomb codes never to be out of reach of a president.

In 1996, John Fritchey, a Democrat who shared a campaign office with Mr. Blagojevich, was told that his stepfather had suffered a serious stroke. He walked over to Mr. Blagojevich, who was making fund-raising calls, and shared the news.

“He proceeded to tell me that he was sorry, and then, in the next breath, he asked me if I could talk to my family about contributing money to his campaign,” recalled Mr. Fritchey, now a state representative and a critic of the governor. “To do that, and in such a nonchalant manner, didn’t strike me as something a normal person would do.”

Yet even political figures like Mr. Fritchey say they were stunned by his arrest last week on charges of conspiracy and soliciting bribes.

Many who know the governor well say that as Mr. Blagojevich’s famed fund-raising capability seemed to have shrunk in recent months and as his legal bills mounted after years of federal investigation, he appeared to have evolved from what Mr. Fritchey considered callous into something closer to panicked or delusional.

“It’s hard to imagine what could have been going through his head for this to reach such a brazen point,” Mr. Fritchey said. “The irony is, had he simply delivered on the promises on which he campaigned rather than pursuing his belief that success would come through an abundance of fund-raising, his path might look like he wanted it to.”

Now, officials at all levels are calling for his resignation or impeachment. And the public image he had cultivated as an agent of change in Illinois has been subsumed by the stories about his conduct in private. Today, he barely has an ally in sight.

Long before this, he disagreed over a casino with Mayor Richard M. Daley of Chicago; he irked Michael Madigan, the powerful Democratic state speaker, over the budget; and he infuriated just about every legislator by staying put in Chicago (rather than moving his family to the Governor’s Mansion in Springfield). His penchant for promoting his headline-grabbing proposals — like those for universal preschool and cheaper drugs from Canada — on television, rather than in the quieter halls of Springfield, also won him no friends.

“Rod reveled in fighting with members of the General Assembly,” said Representative Tom Cross, the state Republican leader. “He came out of the box fighting: He was the populist, and we were the big, bad General Assembly. He didn’t seem interested in policy, the budget was in disarray, and he was never there.”

Neither Mr. Blagojevich’s spokesman nor his lawyer, who has said that Mr. Blagojevich feels that he is innocent of the charges against him, would consent to be interviewed.

Whatever else may have come apart within Mr. Blagojevich in recent months, one quality, unabashed ambition, has been a constant, his colleagues and his critics say. Even with approval ratings that had sunk to 13 percent as details of the federal investigation into his administration had seeped out over the past three years, Mr. Blagojevich, incredulous prosecutors say, still spoke in his recorded conversations in the past six weeks of the possibility of remaking his political future and running for president, perhaps in 2016.

That aspiration was nothing new.

At points in early 2004, Mr. Blagojevich appeared with Senator John Kerry, the Democratic presidential candidate, at a community center in Evanston and a junior high school in Quincy. Mr. Blagojevich seemed confident, said two former employees, who refused to be named out of concern that their comments could jeopardize their current work, that he would soon be selected as Mr. Kerry’s running mate. (An aide to Mr. Kerry’s campaign says he was never under consideration.) At the time, there seemed only one problem: Mr. Blagojevich was uncertain he wanted to be a No. 2.

Mr. Blagojevich rose to power from unlikely roots. His father was a steelworker from Serbia and his mother collected tickets for the Chicago Transit Authority.

Mr. Blagojevich graduated from Northwestern University, and received his law degree from Pepperdine University, working to help pay for it.

Back in Chicago, he worked briefly as an assistant prosecutor under Mr. Daley, who was then the Cook County state’s attorney.

But Mr. Blagojevich’s political career may have been sealed the day he met his future wife, Patti Mell, at a fund-raiser in 1988 for her father, Richard Mell, a ward chief on the Northwest Side and a powerful alderman for more than three decades. Three years later, he was doing precinct work for Mr. Mell, and not long after, Mr. Mell suggested that he run for state representative — with the help of Mr. Mell’s vast ward operation.

Mr. Blagojevich spent four years in the State House, six years in the United States House of Representatives, and then, in 2002, he ran for governor.

The moment could not have been more welcoming for a Democrat. Gov. George Ryan, a Republican who was by then engulfed in a corruption scandal, did not run for re-election, and the Republican who did had a long record of public service but an unfortunate last name: Ryan.

Mr. Blagojevich focused his campaign on pledges of reform and clean government, and won. Once in office, even amid accusations of campaign donations being exchanged for state jobs, Mr. Blagojevich continued to promote himself as a lonely fighter against the gargantuan pressures of lobbyists and lawmakers — pressing for tougher ethics laws, appointing inspectors general and sending state employees to “ethics training.”

Before the cameras, Mr. Blagojevich was a cheery presence — the No. 1 Cubs fan, an Elvis buff, an avid runner who jogged through the annual twilight parade before the State Fair, darting back and forth to shake as many hands as he could find.

Behind the scenes, though, members of Mr. Blagojevich’s staff saw a different man: one who was deeply concerned about his appearance (particularly his signature black hair, which he ignored suggestions to change) and who usually worked from his home or his North Side campaign office and could often be seen, mid- or late-morning, making a six-mile run trailed by his security team.

“God forbid you make a mistake,” said one longtime former employee. In December 2003, the employee recalled, Mr. Blagojevich flew into a rage because he thought he was late for a holiday tree-lighting ceremony in Springfield, and his two young daughters — who were visiting with Santa Claus in the parlor of the Governor’s Mansion — did not have their shoes on yet. “You’re trying to sabotage my career!” the employee recalled Mr. Blagojevich screaming at staff members, as he charged into the parlor. “You’re the worst!”

At Christmastime in 2004, a nasty spat cropped up between Mr. Blagojevich and Mr. Mell and the fallout stretched well beyond the family, offering some of the clearest public hints of Mr. Blagojevich’s coming troubles.

Mr. Blagojevich shut down a landfill operated by a relative of Mr. Mell, saying it was taking types of waste it was not licensed to accept. Mr. Mell accused Mr. Blagojevich of shutting the facility as a personal vendetta against him, and then accused his top fund-raiser of trading appointments to state commissions and boards for campaign donations, just the image Mr. Blagojevich had been trying to avoid.

Though Mr. Mell (who is said to still be estranged from the Blagojevich family) later recanted his comments, state officials said they were investigating, and, in 2006, a letter between federal and state prosecutors became public, revealing that Patrick J. Fitzgerald, the federal prosecutor, was already investigating claims of “endemic hiring fraud” in the Blagojevich administration.

Mr. Blagojevich said that he welcomed “each and every agency” that was seeking the truth. But, with the passing months, lawmakers and other colleagues said the pressure of the investigation seemed to weigh on the governor.

Knowledge of the investigation was widespread when Mr. Blagojevich ran for re-election in 2006, and he still won 50 percent of the vote. Some political experts thought Judy Baar Topinka, then the Republican state treasurer, was weak opposition to Mr. Blagojevich’s one-on-one charm. And Mr. Blagojevich spent $27 million, nearly three times what Ms. Topinka spent.

“We couldn’t compete on the money angle of it, and maybe now we know why,” Ms. Topinka said last week, adding that she had long been told by lobbyists that they had to “drop a $10,000 entry fee” to work with Mr. Blagojevich. “Anything that didn’t move was sold,” she asserted.

Still, as time went on, colleagues said fund-raising seemed to grow increasingly difficult even for Mr. Blagojevich, who had always been seen as a master at it.

Legal bills, meanwhile, began to mount: his campaign records show he had paid more than $1 million to a law firm, Winston and Strawn (which no longer represents him), and a report as of June 30 this year revealed that the campaign owed $750,000 more to the firm.

Other politicians began to avoid public appearances with him and speaking invitations dropped. Mr. Blagojevich, who had once seemed to bask in news coverage, found himself answering questions about the corruption investigations at nearly every event. After his arrest on Tuesday, Mr. Blagojevich met with almost no one, other than lawyers and ministers.

Not long after his spat with his father-in-law was made public in early 2005, setting off more corruption investigations, Mr. Blagojevich reflected on his work, and said it had changed him in a way.

“What I’ve discovered since I’ve been governor is that there’s a certain loneliness to this job,” he said in an interview. “There’s a loneliness and a certain sadness because you have to isolate yourself to some extent. There are so many people who want so many different things from you.”

NY TIMES Background

Rod R. Blagojevich, the governor of Illinois, was arrested on Dec. 9, 2008 on federal corruption charges. Prosecutors said that Mr. Blagojevich had conspired to profit from his authority to appoint a successor to Barack Obama, who resigned his Senate seat after being elected president.

Mr. Blagojevich vehemently denied the charges and rebuffed calls to resign. On Dec. 30, he appointed Roland W. Burris, a former state attorney general, to take Mr. Obama's seat, to the dismay of Democratic leaders of the Senate.

On Jan. 9, 2009, the Illinois House of Representatives voted 114-1 to impeach Mr. Blagojevich, after a House panel laid out what they called a rampant pattern of abuse of power.

Mr. Blagojevich (pronounced bluh-GOY-uh-vich) was elected governor of Illinois in 2002 after campaigning as a reformer. He was re-elected in 2006 but soon became embroiled in a federal investigation that initially focused on members of his administration. Icy standoffs with the state Legislature (controlled by his fellow Democrats), combined with the steady stream of revelations from the investigation, drove his approval rating down to 13 percent in a Chicago Tribune poll in mid-2008.

Before winning the governorship, he was a member of Congress representing the North Side of Chicago and was seen as a rising star in the party. When he won the governor’s race in 2002, the Democrats had not been in the governor’s mansion since 1977.

The son of a Serbian steelworker and son-in-law of a powerful Chicago ward boss, Mr. Blagojevich used Chicago as a launching pad to higher political goals. With a populist touch, he ran for governor as a reform candidate promising to clean up the state’s messy politics and to change the mood after the previous governor, George Ryan, a Republican, was sentenced to six and a half years in federal prison for racketeering and fraud.

The federal investigation into influence peddling had led by mid-2008 to the indictment of 13 people, many with close ties to Mr. Blagojevich. But the greatest damage to his political standing came from the trial and conviction of Antoin Rezko, one of his closest supporters. Mr. Rezko was one of Mr. Blagojevich’s top fund-raisers, bringing his campaign more than $1.4 million from 2001 to 2004, according to the federal authorities.

Mr. Blagojevich denied any wrongdoing, but his name surfaced repeatedly in the trial. Witnesses told of conversations with him in which he spoke of or seemed to condone rewarding campaign contributions with jobs.

Joseph Cari, a former national Democratic fund-raiser who pleaded guilty to attempted extortion, testified that Mr. Blagojevich told him of plans to finance his dreams of higher office by rewarding donors with state contracts.

And Stuart Levine, the government’s star witness, who pleaded guilty to money laundering and fraud, said that when he went to Mr. Blagojevich to thank him for a state board appointment, the governor said, “Stick with us and you’ll do very well for yourself.”

In the case that led to his arrest, prosecutors say Mr. Blagojevich called the opportunity to choose Mr. Obama's replacement a "gold mine.' They said that wiretapped conversations caught him discussing gaining “a substantial salary” at a nonprofit foundation or organization connected to labor unions, placing his wife on corporate boards where she might earn as much as $150,000 a year and trying to gain promises of campaign money, or even a cabinet post or ambassadorship, for himself.

According to the statement from prosecutors, Mr. Blagojevich told an adviser last week that he might “get some (money) upfront, maybe” from one of the candidates hoping to replace Mr. Obama. That person was identified only as “Candidate 5.”

In an earlier recorded conversation, prosecutors said, Mr. Blagojevich said he was approached by an associate of “Candidate 5” with an offer of $500,000 in exchange for the Senate seat. Prosecutors later identified Candidate 5 as Representative Jesse L. Jackson Jr. Mr. Jackson denied making any offer to Mr. Blagojevich or authorizing anyone to do so, and said he had been told by prosecutors that he was not the target of an investigation.

The case against Mr. Blagojevich stems not only from the charges involving Mr. Obama’s former Senate seat, but also from accusations of pay-to-play corruption in state government, including that he threatened to withdraw $8 million in money to a children’s hospital in exchange for a $50,000 political contribution, that he extorted the Chicago Tribune, and that he expanded a state health care program without the state legislature’s approval.

Biography

Bio data

Governor's Information

Illinois Governor Rod R. Blagojevich
Born: December 10, 1956
Birth State: Illinois
Party: Democrat
Spouse: Patricia Blagojevich
Family: Married Patricia Mell; two children
Religion: Eastern Orthodox
School(s): Northwestern University; Pepperdine University
Address: State Capitol
207 Statehouse
Springfield, IL
62706
Phone: 217/782-6830
Fax: 217/524-4049

Governor's Web Site
State Web Site

Higher Office(s) Served: Representative
ROD R. BLAGOJEVICH was born on the northwest side of Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from Northwestern University in 1979 and earned a law degree from Pepperdine University in 1983. After holding political offices in the Illinois General Assembly and the U.S. House of Representatives, Blagojevich was elected Governor of Illinois in November 2002 and reelected in November 2006.

During his term as Governor, Blagojevich enacted important changes that expanded access to healthcare, improved education, bolstered public safety and spurred growth in Illinois’ economy. Blagojevich’s vision and efforts made affordable health insurance available to all children under the award-winning All Kids program. He also raised the eligibility for Family Care to provide more low-wage working parents with adequate health care, and launched Illinois Cares Rx which protects Illinois seniors from gaps in the federal Medicare Part D program.

Blagojevich has made education a top priority, investing $3.8 billion in new funding for Illinois schools during his first term. He also established Preschool for All which will offer free, high-quality preschool to every three and four-year old, starting with those most at-risk of academic failure. Because of his dedication to early childhood education, funding for preschool has gone up 75% over the past 5 years, giving 35,000 at-risk kids the opportunity to get a head-start on a good education.

Since 2004, when Blagojevich raised the minimum wage to $6.50 an hour, Illinois has added more than 150,000 new jobs. In 2006, he won legislative approval for two additional increases in Illinois’ minimum wage that will take effect in July of 2007 and 2010. In addition, during his first term, the state invested more than $60 million to advance the skills of more than 230,000 Illinois workers at almost 4,700 companies through a vital workforce-training program to ensure that Illinois employees have relevant skills both today and in future.

Blagojevich's public safety initiatives are far-reaching, taking extra steps to protect Illinoisans from homeland security threats, identity theft and hate crimes. During his first term, the Governor launched a new Internet Crimes Unit, which is dedicated solely to combating online crime; hired 320 new frontline Illinois State Troopers; and dramatically reduced a long-standing backlog of untested DNA evidence by launching a new initiative that enables the Illinois State Police (ISP) to perform all forensic DNA analysis in-house.

Blagojevich and his wife Patti have two young daughters, Amy and Annie.