Illinois Senate Scandal Could Drag on for Months

Writing on his personal blog, Associate Clinical Professor of Law at Cornell University William Jacobsen has an interesting take on the Illinois Senate Scandal, in which Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich allegedly conspired to auction off an appointment to President-elect Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat. Jacobsen has been reading the coverage of the recent decision of the Illinois House of Representatives panel holding impeachment hearings against the governor not to call Obama's chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and close friend Valerie Jarrett to testify. Jacobsen writes that a key distinction is missing from the media's reporting.

Jacobsen says that the media is treating the decision as if it were final, rather than temporary. He says that ultimately Emanuel and Jarrett will have to testify before the Illinois Senate, which will try Blagojevich on the articles of impeachment that the House will eventually pass. That trial will be presided over by the Chief Justice of the Illinois Supreme Court, not a political office holder, and will be subject to similar rules of evidence as are found in a court of law. In short, says Jacobsen, Blagojevich has a right to a fair impeachment trial under the state constitution, he does not necessarily have a right to a fair impeacent hearing before the Illinois House. Neither U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald nor the Illinois Democratic Party can count on being able to control the proceedings. And that means they will not be able to control the flow of information

If Jacobsen is right, as he appears to be, the scandal could drag on for months, dogging the nascent Obama Administration every step of the way. Jacobsen even considers that the impeachment trial could be postponed until after the criminal trial, if Fitzgerald is successful in petitioning the Chief Justice that the impeachment proceedings could prejudice the criminal one. All the while, more details and revelations will be uncovered and rumors will continue to swirl around the president-elect and his closest advisers. All the more reason for Obama to come out and hold a wide-ranging press conference to deal with all questions about his association with Blagojevich; and any part, however small, he or his staff may have played in the scandal. So far, however, President-elect Obama's instinct has been to duck questions on the matter. He may regret that decision months from now, as the scandal continues to sap bits of the political capital he earned on Election Day.