Yesterday it was confirmed that Jesse Jackson Jr. is the 'Candidate 5' named in the criminal complaint against Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. The complaint says that an associate of 'Candidate 5' allegedly said he could offer the governor between half a million and a million dollars for the seat, possibly in the form of a campaign donation. It isn't clear how much Jackson knew about what was going on, and Zachary Roth at TPM cites CNN saying that Jackson was not caught on tape speaking to Blagojevich:
Talking to legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, Blitzer said that according to law enforcement sources, Pat Fitzgerald's office does not have recordings of Jackson himself speaking to Rod Blagojevich as part of the US Attorney's investigation into the governor.
If true, that would be significant, because the indictment filed yesterday against the governor quotes him telling an aide that an "emissary" from Jackson approached the governor and proposed a "pay-to-play" deal in regard to the open US Seante seat that Blagojevich has the power to fill.
As Roth notes, this lessens the possibility that Jackson himself will be implicated in the case, but it doesn't necessarily mean that Jackson knew or didn't know what was happening. For his part, Jackson says "I did not initiate or authorize anyone at any time to promise anything to Governor Blagojevich at any time."
--A. Serwer
