Blagojevich's lawyer to submit internal report to impeachment panel

SPRINGFIELD -- Gov. Blagojevich's lawyer Monday intends to submit President-elect Barack Obama's internal report to a House impeachment panel as evidence the governor wasn't trying to enrich himself while deciding who to appoint to Illinois' vacant U.S. Senate seat.

Denied the ability to subpoena Obama's inner circle, defense attorney Ed Genson told the Chicago Sun-Times Sunday that the report will buttress his arguments the governor has done nothing wrong and deserves to remain in office.

"Since I can't subpoena anyone, this is the next best thing," Genson said.

Last week, Obama's transition team released a report concluding that incoming White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel had one or two phone calls with Blagojevich regarding the Senate appointment and another four calls with the governor's former chief of staff, John Harris, who also has been charged.

The Obama report noted that Emanuel was pushing Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett for the seat but concluded no wrongdoing on the part of Obama's aides or any indication that the governor was attempting to seek a cabinet appointment or ambassadorship under Obama in exchange for appointing Jarrett or anyone else.

The chairwoman of the House Special Investigative Committee, Majority Leader Barbara Flynn Currie (D-Chicago), said she expects Genson will be permitted to submit the Obama report as evidence in the impeachment inquiry.

"My inclination is the committee will grant that request," she said Sunday.

Currie turned down a bid by Genson to subpoena Emanuel, Jarrett, U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. and Chicago Tribune executive Nils Larsen after U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald objected, saying their testimony before the impeachment panel could "significantly compromise" the criminal probe against Blagojevich.

The Sun-Times identified Jackson as the unnamed "Senate Candidate 5" and Larsen as an unnamed Tribune "financial adviser" who were referred to in a 76-page criminal complaint Fitzgerald lodged against the governor on Dec. 9.

Blagojevich was charged after secret government recordings allegedly showed he was trying to leverage his appointment for the open Senate seat in exchange for a federal post or high-paying jobs for himself and wife, Patti Blagojevich.

Fitzgerald's office "basically has said the governor was trying to sell the seat to Jarrett and Jackson. I have statements in the Obama report that nobody tried to sell a seat," Genson said.

But Currie cast doubts Sunday on whether the Obama report itself absolves the governor of wrongdoing.

"Maybe in this particular instance someone didn't run a stop sign, but it doesn't say they didn't run a different stop sign," she said.

The impeachment panel did not hear from Fitzgerald this weekend about its request for the blockbuster government tape recordings that were the cornerstone of the federal charges against the governor.

"They understand this is urgent," Currie said of the U.S. attorney's office, "so I suspect we'll hear from them very soon."

Genson tentatively has been given the floor Monday when the committee reconvenes in Springfield to present a case against impeachment, though that could be changed if the tapes are turned over to the panel.

Meanwhile Sunday, Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn predicted on CBS' "Face the Nation" that Blagojevich would be impeached by the House and convicted in the Senate before Abraham Lincoln's bicentennial celebration Feb. 12.

"I think there's many articles of impeachment that will be found by the committee and referred to the entire House. If a majority of the House votes for impeachment, then the governor's impeached and then a trial is held in the Illinois Senate. Two-thirds of the members of the Senate must vote to convict, and I think there's far more than that ready to do that," Quinn said.