RFI’s Statement on Speaker Madigan, ComEd, and the Urgent Need for Reform

On Friday, we learned that Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan is at the center of a federal investigation into a years-long bribery scheme involving the public utility ComEd. In light of these revelations, Reform for Illinois is calling for the resignation of Speaker Madigan — and for long overdue structural reform in Illinois.

It is because of situations like this that Illinois has the least-trusted state government in America. Yet too often in the face of corruption, our elected officials have pursued superficial measures that do little to change the status quo. The time has come for that to change.

The facts in this case are alarming. In exchange for a deferred prosecution deal requiring the company to pay a $200 million fine, ComEd admitted to showering Speaker Madigan with favors with the aim of advancing legislation that would benefit its bottom line. According to federal prosecutors, ComEd received at least $150 million in legislative benefits while shoring up the Speaker’s patronage empire by providing jobs, contracts, and payoffs to Madigan associates. Some of those legislative benefits likely resulted in costs to consumers.

We’ve seen enough. Regardless of whether prosecutors manage to collect enough evidence to clear the very high bar of indictment for public corruption offenses, it is clear that Madigan leads an organization steeped in criminal practices that harm the people of Illinois. It strains credulity that the Speaker was unaware of what his closest associates were doing on his behalf; if he was, his ignorance was either wilful or negligent. Either way, it’s unacceptable conduct for the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives.

Speaker Madigan should resign as Speaker of the House and let Illinoisans get to the business of enacting real ethics reform, cleaning up their state, and beginning a new era in Illinois politics.

That means instituting legislative leadership term limits so no one can accumulate this amount of power again.

It means empowering the Legislative Inspector General’s office to investigate ethics violations in the General Assembly and publish its findings without asking permission from the legislators it’s supposed to oversee.

It means implementing a public campaign finance program so elected officials can be accountable to their everyday constituents, not to party power brokers and wealthy donors.

It means passing redistricting reform so legislative leaders can’t distort the democratic process to reward loyal party members and protect them from accountability.

It means strengthening our lobbying regulations and our conflict of interest rules so Illinoisans don’t have to wonder if their representatives are putting their private businesses over the public interest.

Other states have pulled themselves out of the quagmire of cronyism and corruption, and Illinois can too. It’s time for Speaker Madigan to go, and for Illinoisans to finally get to work on building the government they deserve.