* Governor Blagojevich had this to say yesterday about the Tony Rezko trial…
“I am not involved in this court case. I don’t know much about it. I have a job to do as governor. It’s a full-time job. I don’t think it’s fair to comment on a pending court case.”
That’s the response the governor should have given all along to this thing. Instead, he has injected himself into the debate from the very beginning. Here’s a comment from 2005 about Joe Cari’s plea agreement…
“This is hearsay upon hearsay upon hearsay from someone who just pled guilty to extortion,” the governor said, “What I find aggravating, because of this triple hearsay from someone who just pled guilty to extortion, I’m in a position to have to answer questions like this. I’m happy to do this, but it’s frustrating.”
So, now he he’s caught in a box. The “I can’t comment” line won’t work because he has commented several times before. Dumb.
* Meanwhile, it looks like Patrick Fitzgerald sandbagged Rezko’s team…
The defense filing also criticized the government for apparently flip-flopping on whether to air at trial a “clout list” of nearly 40 individuals purportedly recommended for state jobs by Rezko. Prosecutors initially described the list as a trial exhibit but on Tuesday said they did not plan to introduce it after all.
Thinking the clout list would be fodder at trial, Rezko’s lawyers made the document public in a filing last week, prompting numerous headlines, the defense noted Wednesday.
Rezko’s lawyers have a point, but it’s also true that they got outmaneuvered here. Oops.
* The prosecution is trying to claim that Rezko broke the law because he needed money…
Indicted campaign fundraiser Antoin “Tony” Rezko was deeply in debt, and jurors should understand that as a motive for his alleged political corruption, prosecutors told a federal judge Wednesday.
“Without the evidence, the defendant will almost certainly argue that he was financially healthy and therefore had no motive to commit the charged criminal activity,” federal prosecutors told Judge Amy J. St. Eve in a filing.
* And the Sun-Times looks at Tony Rezko’s billionaire buddy