The tapes have built a foundation on which prosecutors hope to show that when Madigan gave orders, legislators, lobbyists and executives alike snapped into action to please him.
More tapes are expected to be played when the trial resumes Monday. Also expected to testify Monday is state Rep. Bob Rita, D-Blue Island, who was a co-sponsor of one of ComEd’s massive pieces of legislation that passed in 2016.
But the recorded calls played in court underscored how the speaker was on high alert, still feeling the effects of separate #MeToo scandals involving his own misbehaving aides. Against that backdrop, the recordings in the ComEd probe captured a moment of Madigan and McClain in the process of calculating how to end Lang’s 32-year legislative career over optics.
“And that lady was going to call Lou,” McClain said, adding he would put in motion a plan to “make sure that woman makes that call.”In a Nov. 3 conversation, McClain asked pointedly when Madigan wanted him to “lower the boom” on Lang, and Madigan said the “sooner rather than later.”Five days later, Nov. 8, McClain called Lang, who long dreamed of moving up to majority leader and then one day to speaker, about “moving along to another career.
In federal court Thursday, he loudly denounced a defense attorney’s question that referenced “sexual harassment charges.” Lang shot back: “I was not facing sexual harassment charges. I’ll tell you right here in federal court that I resent the allegation and the inference.”In addition to the recorded calls, jurors Thursday learned new details of how Marquez, the ComEd executive in in charge of the utility’s lobbying, came to be a secret government informant.
After about 45 minutes, Marquez told the agents he “had to go to work” and the meeting ended, McDonald said. At that meeting, which was video recorded, Marquez tells McClain he’s worried that new ComEd CEO Joseph Dominguez, a former federal prosecutor, might raise alarms when he sees how much money is being paid on a monthly basis.
Consultant Jay Doherty, right, enters the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse on the first day of the “ComEd Four” bribery conspiracy trial, March 14, 2023.
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