Former ComEd board member Juan Ochoa testified Tuesday that then-House Speaker Michael Madigan supported him for the profitable place on the firm after two of his political mentors, U.S. Reps. Luis Gutierrez and Jesus “Chuy “Garcia, they supported Madigan within the basic election.
Ochoa’s testimony is on the middle of one of many greatest allegations in Madigan’s ongoing corruption trial: an alleged conspiracy by ComEd to achieve Madigan’s affect over the corporate’s legislative agenda.
It’s additionally a lesson within the unusual political mechanizations of Chicago, the place altering demographics in Madigan’s Southwest Side neighborhood have led to an uncommon alliance with Gutierrez and Garcia, two influential Latino politicians who had by no means supported the speaker till the election in 2016.
Ochoa testified Tuesday that shortly after Madigan gained reelection, Gutierrez had a dialog with the speaker about discovering him a place. Ochoa says Madigan known as him a few week later and he met with the speaker in his ward workplace.
“It was speak. I informed him I used to be an entrepreneur. We talked in regards to the election,” Ochoa stated.
Months later, after studying that Jesse Ruiz can be leaving the ComEd board to run for governor, Ochoa determined to run for the place himself, asking Gutierrez to “discover a strategy to get me thought of.”
“I requested him if he would think about organising a gathering with President Madigan and (then) Mayor Rahm Emanuel,” Ochoa testified.
In 2017, Ochoa and Gutierrez met with Madigan, additionally within the thirteenth Ward workplace, Ochoa testified. “I talked to (Madigan) in regards to the significance of getting Latinos on the board,” Ochoa informed the panel. He stated Madigan expressed his assist and stated he would meet with Exelon’s CEO later that week.
But the method dragged on for greater than a yr, partly due to resistance from individuals inside ComEd who did not like Ochoa’s {qualifications}.
Ochoa stated he despatched his resume to ComEd’s then-CEO Anne Pramaggiore’s assistant in November 2017. Two months later, Madigan known as him and knowledgeable him that “somebody from ComEd can be calling me.”
Sure sufficient, in late January 2018, he acquired a name from a ComEd lawyer searching for background data. Ochoa stated at that time that he did not suppose he would get the board place. Months handed after which all of a sudden he obtained a name from Madigan. The speaker informed him he would be a part of ComEd’s board of administrators by the tip of the yr.
In September 2018, Ochoa had dinner with new ComEd CEO Joe Dominguez and Vice President Fidel Marquez, who at that time had not but begun cooperating with the investigation.
“(Dominguez) informed me that ComEd was restructuring its board of administrators and that I’d possible be appointed after the final election,” Ochoa testified. “I felt fairly good at that time.”
At the start of the next yr, nevertheless, the appointment had not but been made. The jury is anticipated to listen to later within the trial that Ochoa known as Madigan’s workplace in February 2019 and left a voicemail requesting a gathering with García himself, a robust Democratic ally who had just lately changed Gutiérrez in Congress.
It wasn’t the ComEd board seat, however the Latino Leadership Council, a political group that García, Gutiérrez and he had just lately shaped.
That day, Madigan was recorded telling McClain about Ochoa’s cryptic message. Apparently assuming it was in regards to the board seat, Madigan instructed McClain to contact him.
At Madigan’s path, McClain known as Ochoa that afternoon to speak in regards to the scenario.
“So I known as (Madigan’s) workplace at present to see if (Chuy) and I can go see him,” Ochoa stated in the course of the name performed in courtroom. “But it actually has extra to do with the Latino Leadership Council group that we shaped, we simply needed to let him learn about it.”
“Oh, OK, (Madigan) interpreted that you just have been calling since you have been annoyed that this appointment hadn’t been scheduled,” McClain stated.
Ochoa stated, “I most likely would have introduced it up, however that wasn’t the intention.”
ComEd lastly made the appointment official two months later.
Madigan, 82, of Chicago, who was speaker of the Illinois House for many years and head of the state Democratic Party, faces racketeering prices that allege he ran his state and political operations as a prison enterprise.
Both Madigan and McClain, 77, a former contract lobbyist for ComEd from southern Quincy state, have pleaded not responsible and denied any wrongdoing.
jmeisner@chicagotribune.com
mcrepeau@chicagotribune.com
