NATIONAL BRIEFING / ILLINOIS
Roland Burris promised to “personally do something” for Rod Blagojevich’s campaign fund while pressing the then-Illinois governor to appoint him to President Obama’s former Senate seat, according to a wiretap transcript.
“Tell Rod to keep me in mind for that seat, would ya?” Burris tells Robert Blagojevich, who headed his brother’s campaign fund, in a Nov. 13 phone call secretly taped by the FBI.
The remark came after Robert Blagojevich urged Burris to “keep me in mind, and you know if you guys can just write checks that’d be fine.”
“OK, OK, well we, we, I, I will personally do something, OK?” Burris says.
Earlier in the conversation, Burris and Robert Blagojevich explored the possibility that Burris might raise campaign money on a larger scale.
“I know I could give him a check,” Burris said. “Myself.”
Burris’ attorney, Timothy Wright, said Burris wrote no checks to the Blagojevich campaign after the conversation. U.S. District Chief Judge James F. Holderman released the transcript publicly and to the U.S. Senate Ethics Committee for its preliminary investigation of Burris’ appointment.
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