Sunday, Feb. 23, 2020 | 2 a.m.
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Rod Blagojevich wanted money for his campaign, and he didn’t care if getting it meant that poor, sick kids would go without health care. So the former Illinois governor blocked $8 million in funding for a statewide pediatric medical care initiative in demand for a $50,000 contribution from the CEO of a children’s hospital in Chicago.
“It is not uncommon for these children to have to wait weeks just to get an appointment with a specialist,” the Chicago Tribune reported at the time. “The $8 million would go toward easing those lines by getting more money to doctors throughout the state.”
This is the kind of person President Donald Trump believes is worthy of a pardon.
In freeing Blagojevich from prison this past week and pardoning such other sleazy characters as former New York police commissioner Bernard Kerik, Trump sent a message to Americans: He and his supporters are free to be as corrupt as they want to be.
Blagojevich was eight years into a well-deserved 14-year sentence when Trump cut him loose, having been convicted of 17 federal corruption charges. His most infamous crime was attempting to sell or trade to the highest bidder the Senate seat once held by Barack Obama.
Then there’s Kerik, who was convicted of eight felonies in 2010, including tax fraud and lying to the federal government while being vetted for senior posts. Among the revelations from his court cases were significant ties between Kerik and a construction firm with ties to organized crime.
Trump, abetted by a Senate that waved him through his impeachment trial, clearly has dropped any pretense of respecting the rule of law. He dismisses any attempts to hold him and his supporters accountable as an abuse of authority, while weaponizing the Justice Department to punish his enemies.
He acknowledged as much with his comments about Blagojevich, suggesting the former governor was the victim of a politically motivated attack involving former FBI Director James Comey and former U.S. attorney Patrick Fitzgerald.
“It was a prosecution by the same people — Comey, Fitzpatrick — the same group,” Trump said, flubbing Fitzgerald’s name and failing to note that Comey worked in the private sectory when Blagojevich was prosecuted.
The truth is that Blagojevich’s prosecution and sentence were entirely justified.
No doubt, there are a number of Americans languishing in prison who are deserving of consideration for a pardon.
The likes of Kerik and Blagojevich aren’t among them.
With Trump’s track record on pardons, he’s shown he’s motivated by making political points either by exciting his base or antagonizing his opponents or both. Fairness and justice? Who cares?
That was especially the case for Blagojevich. His pardon became a pet cause for Fox News, which allowed his wife to make numerous appearances to claim her husband had been treated unjustly.
He wasn’t. Blagojevich, like Trump, reveled in corruption and abusing his power. He got what he deserved.
One more thing that is telling about Blagojevich: The Tribune reported that when he was removed from office in 2009, more than 3,000 requests for commutations and pardons had piled up on his desk. It was the biggest backlog in the nation.
As one Chicago columnist wrote, “every time I heard the oily pleas for mercy from Blagojevich and his wife I was reminded that, when he was governor, he routinely ignored such pleas from others.”
No responsible president would pardon such an immoral, unprincipled character.
Trump, in doing so, put the nation on notice that for him and his supporters, it’s open season for corruption.
