(mellow instrumental music) - Welcome to Capital View where we discuss the latest in state government and politics.

I'm Hannah Meisel with NPR Illinois.

Joining us this week is Charlie Wheeler, director emeritus of the public affairs reporting program at the University of Illinois Springfield.

Welcome Charlie.

- Thank you, Hannah.

- And also here is Dan Petrella, state government reporter for the Chicago Tribune.

Thanks for being here Dan.

- Hi Hannah.

Good to be here.

- Well guys, I really can't believe I'm saying this, but on Wednesday of this week, former house speaker Mike Madigan was indicted.

A lot of folks in the Springfield political orbit thought this day would never happen.

But now it has.

You know, Dan it's been 19 and a half months since Madigan was named public official A in a deferred prosecution agreement that the feds entered into with electric utility, Commonwealth Edison, and you know, reading the indictment at least what's in the first six of the 22 counts in there, is stuff we've already learned since then.

Take us through what is new, what is old?

What is this indictment all about?

- Sure.

Basically it alleges that Madigan, over the course of a decade or so due largely to you know the breadth of the investigation, statute of limitations, things like that, operated his political and government organizations as a criminal enterprise for his own personal gain.

There were allegations that ConEd was writing checks to associates for doing little or no work.

Some of that's been out there, like you said since the deferred prosecution agreement in summer of 2020, that they were placing interns from the 13th ward in the city of Chicago, which is Madigan's base of power on the Southwest side.

You know, giving them internships without having them go through the regular channels, waving grade point average requirements, things like that that other people who were competing for those internships had to do.

And then there's also some things related to a land deal here in Chicago that was never consummated, but there was a piece of state owned property in Chinatown.

And there was a developer that Alderman Danny Solis brought to Madigan.

They wanted the state to transfer the property to the city so that the city could then sell it to this developer.

And the payoff for Madigan was that the developer would use his property tax appeals law firm to assist with that effort.

That never ended up going through.

But there was lots of communication back and forth between Madigan and Michael McClain, who was sort of his top fixer, at least a court of these allegations from the feds.

Just a very wide ranging kind of enterprise.

And basically it all goes back to rewarding political allies of Mike Madigan and bringing business to his property tax appeals firm.

- Alderman Danny Solis, like you mentioned, he is key to not just this investigation, but he's unlocked a lot of things for the feds, because he has been cooperating with the feds for a number of years now, been wearing a wire, you know has numerous reported conversations with Madigan, and a lot of other very important folks.

You know, what's interesting about this deferred prosecution agreement is you know, a lot of the things like you said that we've known now for almost two years since the ConEd deferred prosecution agreement was dropped in the summer of 2020.

It was yeah, it's repackaged in a way that fits into this narrative of these quote on quote Madigan enterprise.

You know fits into these racketeering charges that Madigan and Mike McClain, his longtime confidant, former ConEd lobbyist and friend, you know, are up against.

But you know everything that had to do with Danny Solis, you know we had known a little bit of a about it, but this breaks a lot of things you know wide open that weren't put together before.

So, you know, Charlie, the fed's alleged that Danny Solis you know, said that he would bring Madigan's property tax appeals focus law firm you know a bunch of you know, a bunch of business.

He did this in a couple ways, and you know there's a couple quid pro quo things that were alleged you know, like Dan mentioned, there was this parcel of land, legislature was you know, set to pass a you know, legislation to transfer that land to the city to then sell to this developer.

But also, you know Danny Solis wanted to be, you know, at least he said, we don't know if this was just a performance for you know putting on the show, 'cause he is wearing wire.

But you know, he said hey, I wanna be appointed to a state state board.

You know, a state board that pays preferably over a hundred thousand dollars a year, and you know, in exchange, there's a lot of stuff going on in my world and I'll bring you that property tax business.

You know, Charlie, first of all, did we expect this?

Did we, did you ever see this day coming, but also you know, talk about this is a maybe a more straightforward kind of crime that the feds are alleging versus everything that we've known about ConEd before this.

That's kind of something people might say well that's just how politics work.

- Yeah, and it occurs to me the allegations involving the property tax business from a legal standpoint, they strike me as being more easy to understand and more difficult to defend against.

Particularly if you have a tape as attorney John Lausch put it with the very words.

And here's a quote from him, he says the core of our evidence in this case is the words that are spoken by people.

It's the things that show up on documents and emails.

And so that is in my mind, a more problematic situation because the, what would you say, the initial headline grabbing stuff was all this ConEd stuff.

And Madigan's response has been basically I was doing what I was supposed to do as a elected official.

I was trying to help out my constituents.

I was trying to get people jobs.

I was giving them recommendations, and I didn't do anything wrong.

And I'm thinking for someone who grew up in the in the Chicago democratic or county democratic organization, that was the way things were done, and people of an older generation in Chicago might say to themselves well yeah, that's kind of how things worked.

As a matter of fact that's how things worked in DuPage county.

That's how things worked in Sangamon county with Republicans.

That was kind of the name of the game back in the day.

well times have changed.

And what the US attorney is suggesting is that Madigan did not change.

He continued to use his position to help his friends basically to bolster his political organization.

So as I say that is going to be a more difficult charge to prove I think than one that says hey, if you steer business to me, I'll do a favor for you.

That quick pro quo to use that expression.

And that's something that people are familiar with because there've been a lot of other public officials in Chicago who've gone down for that very kind of thing, not for getting jobs to their friends or working to leverage their influence to get somebody an internship somewhere, but because they lined their pockets through their official activities.

And in the case of Madigan, there's no suggestion that he personally took bribes from ConEd and pocketed them.

Where the the danger in terms of bribery lies in my opinion, is the feds are saying he would take official action as speaker of the house or as the ward committeeman in return for his property tax business being steered to his firm.

And because for much of this time, the Cook county assessor was an ally of his, Joe Berrios, the expectation was that if Megan came in and said oh, here's my client.

And you've got his property assessed for 5 million dollars.

And really it should only be a couple hundred thousand that he gets a kind of break like that.

And as I say, I believe people can understand that easier than some of convoluted political stuff.

And you know, to answer your original question, no, I did not expect that this would happen.

And part of it is I thought that if they had the goods on Madigan, so to speak, or if John Lausch thought he had 'em, he would've announced it long ago.

And I guess I underestimated the tenacity of John Lausch, and the thoroughness of John Lausch, and the fact that he would keep this grand jury going for what more than two years before finally returning the true bill and the indictments.

- Well, I mean, there's a lot there.

I mean, first of all, John Lausch, if we rewind a year ago, his job was in danger.

You know, a new president comes in, John Lausch has a Trump appointee, his job wasn't guaranteed.

And a lot of other US attorneys were being asked for their letters of resignation.

And it wasn't until, you know senators, Tammy Duckworth and Dick Durbin stepped in and said you know, hey Biden justice department, John Lausch is clearly in the middle of an important investigation, please you know, allow him to at least to finish.

And we don't know how long that's gonna take.

You know, John Lausch said on Wednesday afternoon at his very rare press conference, that you know, the investigation was ongoing.

I think I mean, that is kind of a thing that is said, but I think that there is probably gonna be more, and we don't, we don't know how much more, but yeah, I mean, Dan, I'm glad that Charlie- - But it occurs to me that where can the more go in this sense that he's already nailed the what would you say the most prominent target.

It's like saying well, I just run 27 marathons, and I'm gonna go out and do a 5k around the neighborhood.

- That's a good point.

You know, I think a lot of people kind of thought that, yeah I mean, even if John Lausch never did indict Madigan, that he had still accomplished what he kind of set out to because Madigan's been out of power, you know.

We all watched him fail to get a historic 19th term as house speaker, and then you know, resign from his position as you know, just a mere state rep from the 22nd district that he held for 50 years, and then resign as the the chair of the democratic party of Illinois.

But you know, he still does hold other positions, Dan.

He is still a state central committeeman in the state's democratic structure.

And of course, the longest sort of thing that he's held is the, you know being a 13th ward democratic committeeman within the Cook county democratic organization.

You know Robin Kelly as new chair of DPI, and the Cook county democratic party, both asked for Madigan to step down from those positions yesterday.

You know, tell us a little bit more about reaction.

I mean, obviously some of it's predictable.

Republicans who have been using the you know, Madigan is corrupt angle for years now to varying degrees of success.

They couldn't be more jazzed, honestly.

We saw a lot of rejoicing, and you know I think even from the Illinois policy Institute that libertarian leaning think tank, their email subject line yesterday evening was told you so.

- Yeah.

You know, I think it was interesting that the news came out while Pritzker, the governor and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot were together at the University of Illinois in Chicago with Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen talking up the the Biden economic agenda and in the Q and A with Secretary Yellen answering questions about sanctions on Ukraine.

I mean, sanctions on Russia for its incursion into Ukraine.

And then we pivot to the governor and the mayor having to answer questions about this forthcoming indictment, which at that point they hadn't seen, nobody had had seen the paper yet.

But one of the things that struck me was a comment that mayor Lori Lightfoot, a former federal prosecutor and colleague of John Lausch made was essentially you know, as a prosecutor, if you're gonna take this shot, you wanna make sure you're gonna hit your target.

So I think to Charlie's point, it shows that Lausch is very careful and meticulous, and all his investigators in building this case.

You know there may be, there may be other shoes to drop.

There's been some reporting recently about similar activity at a subsidiary of AT&T, which we did not see in the indictment yesterday.

So that's one potential avenue that hasn't been explored yet.

And also I think one thing that's interesting is that it really seems from my colleague, Jason Meisner's reporting that this indictment is also trying to put the squeeze on Michael McClain who is facing separate charges related to the ConEd case.

And you know, they're really trying to get him to flip on Madigan.

He issued kind of a defiant statement about that yesterday.

Another interesting thing that came out is that governor Pritzker last month, really within probably the last couple weeks sat down virtually with federal investigators for about an hour from his home.

He says answered all their questions.

And Lausch said at his news conference that Pritzker is not a target of anything.

They were talking to him as a witness.

But just about his relationship with Madigan.

You know like you said, the Republicans celebrating somberly, I guess is how I would characterize their reaction yesterday.

You know, they point to a special investigating committee in the house back in 2020 that was led current house speaker, Chris Welch which kind of was very rancorous in a very partisan way and disbanded without really you know, talking to many witnesses, the Democrats on the committee blocked subpoenas.

They were supposed to be investigating whether Madigan had conducted conduct unbecoming of a lawmaker, but sort of reached a deadlock on that.

You know, I think in an election year this is not something that Democrats are eager to see.

I think it's gonna be another weight hanging around their neck, but like Republicans have been beating up on Madigan for a long time.

So it will be interesting to see how much more that moves the needle now that this is is out there and is actual criminal charges.

- Sure.

Yeah.

And you know, I wanna talk about Mike McClain for a bit.

You know, he is a constant presence in all of this.

He, you know, the indictment says in a couple places that Mike McClain, I mean, he served to be a go between, he served to shield Madigan from having to you know have direct contact with these third parties.

Except for I, in one interesting area of the indictment someone who was getting, you know, participating, getting a basically a paycheck for do nothing job with ConEd, they approached Madigan at some point, I think in 2018, 2019, and said, you know, said basically they were concerned that they weren't doing anything from ConEd, and said and Madigan allegedly said you know not to worry, you're doing exactly what you're meant to do.

What matters to us is that you're doing the political work.

You know, this is just the arrangement, but you know, Mike McClain, this is a pattern with Madigan.

I mean, if we roll back a few, almost four years ago now, when Mike Madigan had to oust his you know chief of staff all around right hand man, you know also served as house clerk, and executive director of the democratic party of Illinois, Tim Mapes.

You know that was someone who shielded Madigan from you know, knowing what was going on.

You know within a couple places, but especially within the legislative structure.

And you know, there was allegations of harassment that also came you know a few months after allegations of harassment from Alaina Hampton on the political side.

And you know, Mapes had to be fired, but with every person close to Madigan that you know, he had to distance himself from, that he became more and more vulnerable himself right Charlie?

- In a way the times caught up with Madigan in that the the stuff that's the bulk of this indictment from the US attorney about his criminal enterprise, the bulk of it dealt with what used to be common politics in Chicago and in Illinois.

Where you hire your friends, you have precinct workers, whose job is to deliver the vote, they're on somebody's payroll, they get a check.

They don't expect them to show up.

That was in both parties.

Now there was a decision, the Rutan decision that forbade hiring a promotion based on political affiliation.

That came down against governor Thompson because he had a great patronage operation.

And so Madigan's people didn't adjust to that.

And when you think about it, it wasn't all Ken Griffin's money.

It wasn't Jim Durkin's outrage that got Madigan booted out as speaker.

It was the courage of 19 rank and file Democrats who stood up and said we will not vote you in as speaker again.

And they could not be persuaded.

They could not be conjoled.

They could not be threatened.

And as a result, Madigan saw the handwriting on the wall and he withdrew his, I guess he froze his candidacy to see what would happen.

And the people, the 19 were adamant.

And Chris Welch became the speaker a little more than a year ago.

- Yeah, and you know, it's so interesting.

We see Democrats trying to move on, at least most of them, obviously there is a lot of, there's some folks who have nostalgia for you know, the way things were.

Certainly, you know we're getting into election year and it's gonna be the first election year without Madigan you know, protecting Democrats, you know, especially his house democratic members.

But you know, we see Democrats desperately trying to move on, but yet, you know they have to contend with all of these power structures that Madigan built over decades.

And Dan, I mean, do you, how long might it take for Democrats to you know, kind of make, you know restructure their party in a way that, you know, they feel free of Madigan?

How long, that could take a long time?

- Well, I think it's gonna be an interesting test this year, especially you know, I would assume that a lot of the ground level political workers who worked for the Madigan organization haven't left the party are probably are still gonna be working, you know, on people's campaigns.

Obviously there's a new state party head.

There's a new speaker of the house, but it'll be interesting to see if they sort of are able to marshal their resources and everything in the same way, with the same discipline.

You know it'll be very fascinating to watch what their strategy is.

I think, you know, it's sort of been this anchor that they've tried to shed over the last few years.

You even saw Democrats starting to run as being opposed to Madigan, especially in the suburbs where they've picked up seats in the last few election cycles, but you know, does this tie them to him again now that this is gonna be playing out in court?

I think that's a big question.

I think the Republicans are going to try very, very hard to hang that on every democratic candidate up and down the ballot.

- Yeah, absolutely.

And you know, we saw that in 2020, and that was some of the reason that you know, you might say that governor Pritzker's graduated income tax failed and Supreme Court Justice Tom Kilbride became the first Illinois you know Supreme Court Justice to ever not win his retention race, but we will see where things go.

Certainly interesting times in Illinois politics, grateful to be part of it.

On a final note, this will be my last episode as host of Capital View.

I will be taking some time off.

As Illinois lawmakers program returns to air next week through the end of spring legislative session, I'll be back when Capital View returns, this time as a panelist.

It's been an honor hosting.

Thank you for letting me into your living rooms and for the kind emails.

And thank you for, to the production crew at WISE in Springfield, and WSIU in Carbondale.

I'd like to thank my guests, Charlie Wheeler, Dan Petrella.

Till next time, thanks for watching Capt ital View.

I'm Hannah Meisel.

We'll catch you again next time.

(upbeat instrumental music)