Rod Blagojevich convicted, and Those Fabulous Blago Brothers: The Tampa years
January 29, 2009 at 6:14 pm by Wayne GarciaOur favorite indicted, removed-from-office-on-Thursday governor, Illinois’ Rod Blagojevich, is a uniquely Chicago phenomenon. So why does so much of his back story take place in Tampa?
It turns out that Blago’s family, a friend’s campaign money, his publicist and even the former governor himself all — at some point — spent time in the Cigar City. (Blago did a stretch at the University of Tampa in the 1970s. But more about that later.)
Robert Blagojevich, left, at the UT 2008 commencement. (University of Tampa)
The most recent Tampa-factoid in the Blago saga emerged in the past two weeks, as the Illinois Senate prepped for his impeachment trial and new tapes came out detailing various cell phone conversations by the governor and his associates. Blagojevich had quite a cast of characters surrounding him, including one named Betty Loren Maltese, who was once the mayor of Cicero, Ill., and is now in prison. ABC 7 in Chicago reported:
For more than two years, Maltese’ bulging campaign fund had invested millions of dollars through a company headquartered in Tampa, Florida, the firm Invest Financial Corporation. Its CEO at the time was Robert Blagojevich, the governor’s older brother.
State records show that between July of 2000 and September of 2002, Robert Blagojevich’s company paid Maltese’ campaign fund nearly $3.3 million. The dozens of entries are listed as investment dividends, interest and proceeds from the sale of U.S. Treasury bills.
Some of the investment payments from Robert Blagojevich’s company occurred even after Mayor Maltese was convicted of swindling $12 million from the town through an insurance firm.
Lawyer Michael Ettinger, who represents the governor’s brother in the current federal investigation, was unaware of the link to Betty Loren Maltese.
On Wednesday at the I-Team’s request, Ettinger had Robert Blagojevich review the state records and Blagojevich reported that “he knows nothing about it” and that the investments must have been made by some other affiliated bank even though his was listed 41 times.
Robert Blagojevich is no longer with Invest; he’s now a real estate investor in Nashville, Tenn. Robert found his cell phone calls wiretapped, as well, and ABC 7 said “Robert Blagojevich has been his ‘brother’s keeper’ since last August or at least the keeper of his brother’s multi-million dollar campaign fund, a political fund that Robert Blagojevich’s lawyer says is likely to be indicted before it’s all over.”
In Tampa, however, Robert Blagojevich is an honored alumnus from the University of Tampa, high-profile enough to earn a shot at giving the May 2008 commencement address. He told the graduating Class of 2008:
My years here were among the happiest and most formative of my life, to include meeting my wife and best friend Julie, in Western Civ. class freshman year. Plant Hall and the campus will always hold fond memories for both of us.
I graduated from this wonderful university 31 years ago, and to be honest with you, I don’t remember who our commencement speaker was or what he said. So I hold no illusions that you’re going to remember anything I say here today.
The 1977 history major, in fact, lured his brother to UT, where Rod spent two years in college before transferring to a more likely Northwestern. Oh, they were heady days, as the former Gov recounted in a Nov. 2003 profile in Chicago Magazine:
The University of Tampa was an odd college choice for a kid “from the neighborhood,” as Blagojevich puts it, but his brother had gone there two years before to play baseball. With a lackluster grade point average and an 18 or 19 on his ACT, Blagojevich admits, “schools like Northwestern, I couldn’t get into.” After two years, Rod got into Northwestern as a transfer student and majored in history.
And finally, one last Tampa connection: The publicist behind Blago’s recent bizzare (but highly entertaining) media blitz while his Senate trial was under way is Hillsborough County resident and former Fox 13 newsman Glenn Selig. Blago hired The Publicity Agency, Selig’s crisis communications firm that also represented frequent wife misplacer Drew Peterson:
“The governor has decided that he wants to speak and tell his side of the story, and he enlisted us to help,” Glenn Selig, the PR firm’s founder, said.
His side, as it turns out, didn’t play so well. The Illinois Senate voted 59-0 to remove Blago from office on Thursday, the first time in the state’s history a governor has been impeached and convicted and the first time in 20 years that a governor in the U.S. has been removed from office in that manner.
