Roland Burris' Memory Improving Day by Day

Monday, in an interview with reporters in Peoria, Senator Roland Burris made significant new admissions concerning his interactions with former Governor Blagojevich's associates prior to his appointment as replacement senator. Specifically, Burris detailed two conversations with Blagojevich's brother Rob.

According to the Chicago Sun Times transcript of Burris' statement, he admitted that before the December election he raised the issue of the senate seat with Blagojevich's brother at the same time the brother asked Burris about fund-raising for the governor:

"The governor’s brother’s on a routine fund-raising call indicated, ‘I am now the new fund-raiser for the governor, and Roland you’ve been helpful for us in the past,’ and I said, ‘Yes, you know, I’ve certainly tried to work with the governor. I’ve tried to help you all. A lot of people didn’t.'"

“And he says, ‘We need to raise some funds. We hope that you could probably get some of your friends together.' I said, ‘What type of money we looking for?’ He says, ‘Can you raise us 10 or 15 thousand dollars?’

“I said, ‘I don’t know but I can’t do it now because we are in the midst of an election. Call me after the election.’ He said, ‘Fine.’"

“So some time shortly after Obama was elected, the brother called. And now in the meantime, I’d talked to some people about trying to see if we could put a fund-raiser on. Nobody was—they said we aren’t giving money to the governor. And I said, ‘OK, you know, I can’t tell them what to do with their money.’"

“So when the brother called me back, I said, ‘Well, look Rob...I can’t raise any money from my friends. I said, maybe my partner and I, you can talk this over and see, could we go to some other people that we might be able to talk to that would help us out if we give--because we give a fund-raiser in the law office, nobody going to show up. We’ll probably have a thousand dollars for you or something to that effect.'"

“Oh, by the way, in that first conversation with him (Rob in October), so that part is where I raise a question about the Senate seat with him. But no other time do we talk about the Senate seat. So then we came back, and when he called me back the third time, because I went to talk to my partner, and we then assessed the situation and said, ‘Look, you know, I’m interested in the Senate seat. I can’t raise any money for him.’ And so he called me back and I told him back and I told him that. I said, 'No. 1, I can’t raise any money for you and I can’t give you any money because I don’t want to have a conflict.' I mean, that should give some indication of my commitment right there to get out of pay to play and they're still trying to tie me in to pay to play.”

This is a startling -- though with what we've come to know about Chicago politics, not surprising -- admission. The fact that all of this was withheld from the Illinois House Impeachment committee during Burris' testimony has to raise questions about potential perjury charges. At the very least, it certainly is consistent with the initial reaction to his appointment -- that any selection by Blagojevich was tainted and should never have been approved.

Roland Burris -- What I meant to say was...

No, that wasn't a Saturday Night Live skit this weekend, that was a real U.S. Senator and his attorney at a press conference to explain some apparent omissions with the Senator's sworn testimony. I realized right away it wasn't SNL, it was too damn funny. If the purpose of the press conference was to clarify the matter and put it to rest, it was a total failure. If it was to further illustrate that Chicago politics is alive and well --- even in the post-Blago era -- and that you can trust politicians to be evasive, unreliable and self-interested, it was a rousing success.

Illinois's newest senator, Roland Burris, and his attorney, Timothy Wright, were in front of a gathering of media this weekend trying to explain newly released information that the Senator had been less than candid during his interview before the Illinois House Impeachment Committee last month. As explanations of the inexcusable tend to do, they only dug the hole Burris put himself in much deeper.

Here's the chronology. December 30th of last year, then-Governor Blagojevich named Burris to take over President Obama's former senate seat. On January 8th, he appeared before the Illinois House impeachment hearings on Blagojevich and gave testimony. Burris was questioned about his contacts with the governor's office prior to his appointment. As the issue facing Blagojevich's impeachment was the pay-for-play -- his attempt to sell the seat -- there was no question in anyone's mind that the legislators were interested specifically in any discussions between Burris and any representative of the governor surrounding the appointment.

During his questioning, Burris said his only contact was with Lon Monk chief of staff and campaign manager. Now, that disclosure could have been enough to disqualify Burris from his appointment as in an earlier affidavit he submitted to the committee he had claimed that:

Prior to the December 26, 2008 telephone call from Mr. Adams Jr., there was not any contact between myself or any of my representatives with Governor Blagojevich or any of his representatives regarding my appointment to the United States Senate.

But, based on his testimony that he did not have any inappropriate conversations, and that the conversation with Monk did not involve any promises or deals, objections to his selection were withdrawn and he was sworn in on January 15th. On January 23rd, Wright notified the Illinois House Majority Leader that Burris wanted to supplement his testimony.

On February 5th, Burris and his attorney filed a new, detailed, supplemental affidavit with the committee because Burris "was unable to fully respond to several matters that were included in questions during his testimony." This supplemental affidavit included details of numerous additional conversations he had with representatives of the governor concerning the senate seat. Significantly, in the affidavit Burris admitted that he had been party to three conversations with the Governor's brother Rob, discussing the senate seat as well as Burris' "assistance in fund-raising for Governor Blagojevich."

This affidavit was not released to the public for nine days. According to Illinois House Republican leader Tom Cross, House Democrats knew about Burris' affidavit and kept it to themselves. It wasn't until the Chicago Sun-Times broke the story that the affidavit came to light.

This latest chapter is corrupt Illinois politics brings up so many problems it's hard to know where to look first. Burris lied in his original affidavit when he claimed he had no conversations with anyone in the Governor's office, then he lied again during his House testimony, then House Democrats buried information about his lies, and then he refused to own up to his lies, claiming he was tried to lie even more during the press conference rather than fessing up.

Burris claimed at the press conference that he did not provide the names of four other people he had contact in over seven separate conversations, because the person questioning him got him off track.

Perhaps the Senate isn't the best place for Mr. Burris if he's so easily distracted?

Here is the transcript of Burris' questioning by House Impeachment Committee members, so you can decide for yourself:

Rep. Jim Durkin: "Did you talk to any members of the governor's staff or anyone closely related to the governor, including family members or any lobbyists connected with him, including, let me throw out some names -- John Harris, Rob Blagojevich, Doug Scofield, Bob Greenleaf, Lon Monk, John Wyma? Did you talk to anybody . . . associated with the governor about your desire to seek the appointment prior to the governor's arrest?"
Burris lawyer Timothy Wright: "Give us a moment." (Wright and Burris confer.)

Burris: "I talked to some friends about my desire to be appointed, yes."

Durkin: "I guess the point is I was trying to ask: Did you speak to anybody who was on the governor's staff prior to the governor's arrest or anybody, any of those individuals or anybody who is closely related to the governor?"

Burris: "I recall having a meeting with Lon Monk about my partner and I trying to get continued business, and I did bring it up -- it must have been in September or maybe it was in July of '08 that, you know, you're close to the governor, let him know that I am certainly interested in the seat."

Later, a Republican committee member raised the topic once more, giving Burris another change to come clean.

Tracy: "You said that you had visited friends perhaps in September of '08 or July of '08 concerning a desire to perhaps be appointed as a senator if our president-elect was elected. And could you give me the names of those friends?"

Burris: "I don't think I said in July. I said they were friends that I contacted after the election, but I was talking to people, I mean I don't know who you want as my friends that I consider as persons. For example, when I handled a press conference to express my interest in the seat, was the press conference -- I did hold a press conference, and some of my friends were there, for instance."

There was a brief digression, then Tracy continued:

Tracy: "But I think I earlier heard you today testify that in September '08 or perhaps as early as July '08, you had visited with some friends about your desire to seek the seat."

Burris: "No, I think I testified that that's when I began to express an interest in it. As I saw that --"

Tracy: "And I just was wondering who those friends were."

Burris: "One of them was my law partner."

Rep. Barbara Flynn Currie, the committee chairman: "Is that when you talked about your interest with Lon Monk? I think that --"

Tracy: "Was it Lon Monk, was that the extent of it was Lon Monk?

Burris: "That came up in our conversation when we were talking about, you know, if he has some excess clients in the lobbying business, you know, as we try to see whether or not he had conflicts somewhere with some type of a client because of his previous relationship with government. That's what we were talking about then.

"And it just came up, and in fact I said, 'Now, Lon, I don't know what's going to happen, but I think I'm qualified to be appointed to the Senate seat.' And Lon said, 'Well, Roland, I think you are, too.' And that was the extent of it."

Tracy: "So you don't recall that there was anybody else besides Lon Monk that you expressed an interest to at that point?"

Burris: "No, I can't recall. Because people were coming to me saying, Roland, you should pursue that appointment, you're qualified, and this was --"

Tracy: "Is there anybody that comes to mind in that light that you can --"

Did Burris name Rob Blagojevich or Doug Scofield or John Wyma or John Harris -- all of whom he named in the supplemental affidavit? No, just a friend of his, Rich Barber.