President Trump is “strongly considering” commuting the 14-year sentence of Rod Blagojevich, the former Illinois governor whose habit of corruption landed him in prison.
Blagojevich, a Democrat, was prosecuted for multiple shakedowns and an attempt to sell former President Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat. Speaking to reporters on Air Force One, Trump described Blagojevich’s offense as something “many” politicians have done.
“I thought he was treated unbelievably unfairly; he was given close to 18 years in prison,” Trump said. “And a lot of people thought it was unfair, like a lot of other things — and it was the same gang, the Comey gang and all these sleazebags that did it. And I’m thinking about commuting his sentence.”
But Blagojevich’s offenses weren’t minor. They were criminal and repetitive. Blagojevich, who appeared on Trump’s Celebrity Apprentice reality TV show, was impeached by the Illinois state Senate, arrested in 2008, and convicted on 17 corruption counts in 2011. His first trial was a disaster: The jury deadlocked on most of the charges, and the court was forced to hold a retrial. Even after the 2011 retrial, a federal appeals court in Chicago threw out four counts against him. But the scope and severity of Blagojevich’s corruption was enough to convince the court that he still deserved every day of 14 years.
There are a few who have argued Blagojevich’s sentence was too harsh since the main case against him — his attempt to sell a U.S. Senate seat — wasn’t cut-and-dry. Fine. What about the time he tried to shake down a Chicago Children’s Hospital? Or when he extorted the owner of two Illinois horse racing tracks? Or when he threatened the Chicago Tribune over its editorial coverage? This was a man who repeatedly used the power of his office to extort others for campaign contributions and other favors. As Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney who oversaw Blagojevich’s prosecution, said, the former governor’s arrest “interrupted a political corruption crime spree.”
Commuting Blagojevich’s sentence would undermine Trump’s entire persona. He’s the man who ran against the corrupt establishment, the man who rails against the “Deep State.” Trump entered the White House to fight against and change this pattern of corruption, not accept it or dismiss it as a common occurrence.
It would also be a political disaster. According to a few reports, Trump’s son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner encouraged him not just to commute, but pardon Blagojevich’s sentence, in part because it would appeal to Democrats. This just isn’t true. Blagojevich is wildly unpopular among both Illinois Democrats and Republicans. Democratic Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s spokeswoman said Blagojevich is in prison because that’s where he “belongs.”
Democratic state Senate President John Cullerton said, “With a unanimous vote the Illinois Senate removed him from office and barred him from ever serving here again, and there’s not a damn thing Donald Trump can do about that.”
Trump’s own party has threatened to revolt if he moves forward with the commutation, arguing that such a move would “set a detrimental precedent and send a damaging message.”
Blagojevich knowingly broke the law over and over again, using his governorship as a weapon when he didn’t get his way. He doesn’t deserve sympathy, let alone a reduced sentence. There are thousands of men and women convicted of lesser crimes who are far more worthy of Trump’s energy. Let Blagojevich rot alongside the corruption he represents.
