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 Federal agents in mid-May raided the Western Illinois home of
one of House Speaker Mike Madigan’s closest allies, former state lawmaker and
lobbyist Mike McClain.
The FBI is spending a lot of time checking out members of Madigan’s inner
circle.
According to the Chicago Tribune, authorities knocked on McClain’s door around
the same time they executed search warrants at the homes of two other close
Madigan allies: former Chicago Ald. Michael Zalewski and former Madigan
political lieutenant Kevin Quinn.
In obtaining a search warrant, law enforcement agents would have had to convince
a judge of probable cause of a crime, and that evidence of a crime existed in
each home.
More than any other political figure, McClain is known to have Madigan’s ear,
often dining and traveling with the speaker. He served as assistant minority
leader under Madigan from 1981 to 1983 and was formerly a Springfield lobbyist
for some of the state’s most powerful interest groups, including Commonwealth
Edison.
McClain retired from lobbying in 2016. “I feel like I’m very close to [Madigan]
and I love him like a brother, and I’m loyal to him,” McClain told the State
Journal-Register at the time. He originally planned to retire in 2015, but
efforts to extend subsidies to two nuclear power plants in Illinois owned by
Exelon kept him in Springfield. McClain was a longtime lobbyist for ComEd,
Exelon’s parent company.
“[W]e had the Exelon bill come up, and my friend Mike Madigan was facing some
tough times, and so [the retirement] kind of got put on hold,” McClain told the
Quincy Herald-Whig.
McClain helped pass the Exelon deal, which raised rates on ComEd customers by
between 25 cents and $4.54 a month. One Democratic state representative at the
time joked that energy industry lobbyists “probably made a lot of money this
last year or two,” according to the Chicago Tribune.
Meanwhile, the Better Government Association and WBEZ reported the Zalewski raid
was part of a probe into “efforts to get work for Zalewski” at ComEd, as well as
“interactions” between Zalewski, Madigan and McClain. Authorities also
subpoenaed records from ComEd related to their Statehouse lobbying activity,
according to BGA and WBEZ.
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Zalewski served as an alderman for 20 years in
Chicago’s 23rd Ward, which overlaps with Madigan’s 22nd House
District on Chicago’s Southwest Side. That district has re-elected
Madigan to the House every two years since 1970. Also in Madigan’s
district is 13th Ward Ald. Marty Quinn, whose brother Kevin saw his
home searched by federal authorities in May.
Kevin was ousted from Madigan’s political operation in 2018 after a
campaign worker accused him of sexual harassment. He was also
deposed as part of a lawsuit alleging Madigan recruited two “sham
candidates” to siphon Hispanic votes away from the speaker’s 2016
Democratic primary challenger, Jason Gonzales. In that deposition,
Quinn admitted to attempting to recruit one of those candidates.
What will come of the raids on McClain, Zalewski and Quinn is still
unclear.
Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s office has so far been silent on news of the
probe into Madigan’s inner circle. As of April, the governor himself
was the subject of an active federal investigation into property tax
appeals on his Gold Coast mansion, according to WBEZ.
So far, Madigan has not been charged with any wrongdoing. But his
power is clear, and unrivaled.
He is the longest-serving legislative leader in U.S. history,
holding the speaker’s gavel for all but two years since 1983. He has
wielded the most undemocratic House rules in the nation to
single-handedly kill popular legislation, and is the only
legislative leader in any state to also serve as chairman of his
party organization. He has drawn the state’s gerrymandered political
maps for three of the past four decades. And he has long been
criticized for his highly lucrative side-job as the owner of
property tax appeals firm Madigan & Getzendanner.
Still, his grip on the state has never appeared more tenuous.
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