Blagojevich Maintains His Total Innocence, Compares His Corruption Case to Trump’s Impeachment: ‘Déja Vu All Over Again’
Convicted felon Rod Blagojevich, just freed from prison thanks to a commutation by President Donald Trump, insisted that he was completely innocent and compared his corruption case to Trump’s impeachment, saying “It’s déjà vu all over again.”
After eight years in federal prison, the former Democratic governor of Illinois and Celebrity Apprentice contestant insisted in an interview with Fox News anchor Trace Gallagher that “I broke no laws, I crossed no lines,” despite having been found guilty in 2011 of 17 counts of wire fraud, extortion, and soliciting bribes. Echoing the president’s frequent attacks on the Justice Department that investigated him during the Mueller probe, Blagojevich instead blamed “uncontrolled, unaccountable, lawless prosecutors” for his many legal convictions.
“They used the standard to convict me that if it was applied to those Congressmen and every U.S. Senator, the same result would’ve happened to them what happened to me. I raised campaign contributions legally and lawfully, I never promised anything or threatened anyone in exchange for campaign contributions,” Blagojevich claims. “The right to seek campaign contributions is not only necessary and routine in politics, it’s also protected by the Constitution, it’s considered by the Supreme Court, a First Amendment right. Without a promise or a threat, there is no crime, there’s no quid pro quo.”
When Gallagher pointed to a scathing statement about Blagojevich’s commutation from the Illinois Republican House caucus, the former governor again maintained that he was innocent and actually a victim of an overzealous Justice Department.
“They ought to point those statements in the direction of the prosecutors who did this to me and many of whom are the same people doing it to President Trump,” Blagojevich replied. “If, in fact, I crossed a line or broke a law, of course, I should serve some time, but I didn’t. They moved the lines with corrupt intent. It’s déjà vu all over again with regard to what they’ve done for President Trump. They are taking routine things and try to criminalize them.”
“You have uncontrollable prosecutors who have no accountability, who are politicizing their power and using them against political figures, taking routine things and turning them into crimes that are not crimes,” he continued, again reprising the “Deep State” themes commonly promoted by some conservatives that officials in the DOJ are secretly working to bring down the Trump White House.
Watch the video above, via Fox News.
