John Harris, Gov Rod Blagojevich’s former chief of Staff, testified Wednesday that he believed Barack Obama knew of Blagojevich’s plot to win himself a presidential Cabinet post in exchange for appointing Valerie Jarrett to the U.S. Senate.

Harris said on the stand in the former governor’s corruption trial that three days after the Nov. 4, 2008, presidential election, Blago told Harris he felt confident Obama knew he wanted to swap perks.

In the tape, Blagojevich is heard talking about another idea — to ask Obama to ask Warren Buffett or Bill Gates to throw $15 million into a health-care related charity account that Blago would manage and live off. In exchange, he’d appoint Valerie Jarrett to Obama’s Senate seat.

Blago had just seen on the news that Obama had changed his mind about putting Valerie Jarrett in the Senate.  Instead, he was considering her for a cabinet post.   But Blago’s not convinced, and he advances his new fund-raising idea.

Rod: This is one of those things where you’re the president-elect of the United States. His people, they go get the money.
Harris: I think that’s a lot easier for them than an appointment, sure…
Rod: You go to these big Democratic multi-billionaires … and you ask them all to give 2, … a couple million each … That’s all they got to do for Valerie Jarrett… that’s not hard for them.

Harris had his doubts. The Obama camp “may have higher priorities,” he related from the stand. But he went along anyway.

Harris told the court:

I was just being agreeable with him.   Just keeping the conversation moving along. There was other matters i was hoping to get to.

Later on the tape, Blago says he wants Harris to find some other Senate candidates.

Blago asked:

Why don’t we start looking for an African-American Tammy Duckworth?  We can, can’t we?

Harris explained the recording this way:

The president understands that the governor would be willing to make the appointment of Valerie Jarrett as long as he gets what he’s asked for. . . . The governor gets the Cabinet appointment he’s asked for.

Harris stated that Blago had the impression that Obama knew what he wanted after talking to a local union representative, who in turn spoke with labor leader Tom Balanoff, with whom Blagojevich met to discuss a Jarrett appointment. 

Harris’ testimony contradicts the government’s previous public statements that Obama knew nothing about deal-making involving the Senate seat appointment, according to Blago’s attorneys.

Wednesday, the defense moved to force the prosecution to turn over FBI reports of the president’s interview with federal agents in December of 2008.   At this time, he is not accused of any wrongdoing.

From the lawyers’ filing:

Testimony elicited by the government from John Harris and wiretaps played in court raise the issue of President Obama’s direct knowledge and communication with emissaries and others regarding the appointment to his Senate seat.

This filing came on the trial’s third day of the lengthy playback of recordings in which Blagojevich is heard over and over again talking with others about ways to personally capitalize on his Senate seat appointment power.

Blagojevich could also be heard cussing and snapping at his wife, Patti, and negating the possibility of a federal position that pays $190,000 a year.

Blagojevich tells national Democratic consultant Fred Yang:

I make $170 . . . So Fred, that has no appeal to me . . . I want to make money. I might as well go out and find a way to make money.

The 2008 internal report from Obama about his staff’s contacts with Blagojevich at the time shows that Balanoff told Valerie Jarrett that Blagojevich was interested in a Health and Human Services Cabinet post.

Recordings also related that Blago had tried to get the Chicago Tribune’s editorial board canned after it ran a series of less-than-flattering stories about the then-governor.

Harris testified that he ignored Blagojevich’s firing directive.

U.S. District Judge James Zagel refused to gag the talkative Blagojevich as prosecutors had asked.  Zagel said Blagojevich keeps proclaiming his innocence, and that anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

The repetition, Zagel said, has made Blagojevich’s out-of-court talk unnewsworthy.

Thursday, the jury got a look  at a short list of candidates President Obama had chosen to replace him in the U.S. Senate.
Harris tells Blago “He doesn’t want to say who he doesn’t like,” adding that if a person Blagojevich was considering was not on Emanuel’s list, “he’s not high on them.”  Harris let Blago know that the message from Emanuel was that Illinois Senate President Emil Jones was not a favored candidate for the U.S. Senate spot.

Federal prosecutors played a tape of the first official message from the new Obama administration about who the president supported for his Senate seat. 

Blago’s chief of staff, John Harris, tells his boss on the phone that Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s future guard dog, had called him to give him a list of four people who Obama would be okay with as his successor in the Senate.  They were Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.; injured Iraq War vet Tammy Duckworth; U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky and Illinois State Comptroller Dan Hynes.

Under oath Harris said that Emanuel told him that no one else in the Obama camp was authorized to talk about the Senate seat. That contradicted previous messages from a union official that Jackson Jr. was not one of Obama’s preferred candidates.

But Blago doesn’t seem to buy the fact that the list Emanuel provided is a genuine list of Obama’s preferences for the Senate seat.  He says:

It’s a *.*. list.  Expletive Initials deleted.

Harris went on to say that the list appeared to be a political maneuver to show that Obama backed a diverse crop of candidates for the Senate seat. The four names included an African-American male, Jackson; a white female, Schakowsky; an Asian-American female, Duckworth; and a white male, Hynes.

Of course, if Blago’s attorneys can get Obama’s interview with the FBI and  the report collaborates Harris’ testimony, things could get very interesting.  Unfortunately, until that happens it is still just hearsay.

Until then, it’s still one of those things that make you go:

Hmmmm. 

Sources:  drudgereport.com, suntimes.com, cbs2chicago.com