Looking to keep the foul odor coming out of Chicago from seeping into Washington, congressional leaders were getting behind a plan to have Barack Obama’s Senate replacement selected by voters in a special election, rather than appointed by Illinois’ governor.
Lawmakers in Springfield, Ill., announced Tuesday that they would call an emergency session of the state legislature to pass a bill requiring the vacancy created by Obama’s election as president be filled by election. The move would deny embattled Gov. Rod Blagojevich a key bargaining chip.
On Capitol Hill Tuesday, Democrats began distancing themselves early from Blagojevich, a former member of Congress. Sen. Richard Durbin, who is also a Democrat from the Land of Lincoln, invited reporters to talk about a mortgage bill he plans to introduce in the next Congress, but the conversation quickly turned to Blagojevich, who was taken from his home in sweatpants early Tuesday to be booked on corruption charges.
Durbin solemnly told the press corps, “This is a sad day for my state of Illinois” and he called for a special election to fill the vacant Senate seat formerly held by President-elect Barack Obama, which prosecutors said Blagojevich was literally trying to sell to the highest bidder.
Durbin, the Senate Majority Whip, stressed that he had little contact with his two-term governor. In fact, Blagojevich wouldn’t even return his calls in a timely fashion, most recently waiting 12 days to phone him back about who to tap to fill Obama’s vacated senate seat.
“We certainly didn’t have a close relationship,” Durbin said. “I found him difficult to communicate with.”
Memories were more vague in the House, despite the fact that Blagojevich served there from 1997 to 2003.
“I was not his close associate,” said Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio. “I don’t know anybody here that would be willing to admit that.”
Rep. Jim Moran, D-Va., said he didn’t recall much about Blagojevich, who during his time here was known for competing in marathons and advocating for gun control legislation.
“He was a good runner,” Moran offered. “I never saw him as governor.”
Rep. Bobby Rush, a Democrat from Chicago, called Blagojevich’s downfall “an end to a pretty shameful and discouraging time. We are at an all-time low in the state.”
Congressional Democrats spent much of Tuesday huddled behind closed doors, talking about the economy and national security, not about the corruption case unfolding 700 miles away in Illinois. Despite their best efforts, a scandal much closer to home came knocking.
Congressional Republicans, who were booted out of the majority two years ago under a corruption cloud made by the Democrats, are hoping to begin turning the tables.
Blagojevich’s arrest, said House Minority Leader John Boehner’s spokesman, Kevin Smith, “is yet another example of the wholesale Democratic corruption for a party that promised to drain the swamp and uphold high standards of ethical conduct.”
