The Megyn Kelly Show - Rod Blagojevich on Corruption in Politics, Overcoming Adversity, and the State of the Democratic Party | Ep. 274

Episode Date: March 4, 2022

Megyn Kelly is joined by Rod Blagojevich, former Illinois governor, to talk about corruption in politics, what the moment was like when he got arrested, why he competed on Celebrity Apprentice, what makes him a "Trump-ocrat" now, what he learned in prison, his early success in politics, the reality of Chicago politics, corruption and "legal bribery," the infamous tapes, how he grew up and starting his career in law, marriage and fatherhood, overcoming adversity, the state of the Democratic party today, whether Blago will run for office again, his next project about police and the Black community in Chicago, and more.Follow The Megyn Kelly Show on all social platforms: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/MegynKellyTwitter: http://Twitter.com/MegynKellyShowInstagram: http://Instagram.com/MegynKellyShowFacebook: http://Facebook.com/MegynKellyShow Find out more information at: https://www.devilmaycaremedia.com/megynkellyshow

Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations. Hey everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show. Today, I am joined by someone who reached the pinnacle of politics, only to see his world come crashing down when then-Senator Barack Obama became president. I am speaking about former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. His journey is fascinating and a cautionary tale of power and corruption, of wheeling and dealing that ultimately landed him behind bars, in part thanks to hundreds of hours of audio from FBI wiretaps that were, some would say, golden. Two years ago, he was released early from federal prison, his sentence commuted by then President Trump, who had hosted the Celebrity Apprentice

before he became president, on which Rod Blagojevich had been a contestant after he'd been impeached and while he was in the midst of criminal trouble, but before he went off to prison. We're going to ask him about all of this and get his very interesting take on the current state of the Democratic Party and on what he learned in prison. Rod Blagojevich, welcome to the show. Thanks for being here. Hi, Megan. Thanks for being here. Hi, Megan. Thanks for having me. Oh, it's a pleasure. I watched the ABC special on you that it's on Hulu now, Blago. What's it called? It's called Being Blago. Being Blago. And it was good. I have to say, my husband watched it and then we roped in our 12 year old son. He started watching it. And you're a fascinating guy. I mean, you're very interesting. You're very open in the documentary.

And your wife gives an interview, too. And it's just like sort of here I am, you know, like it or not, this is me. So anyway, I commend it. And I hope people watch it. So let's talk about you and a little bit about your background. So people who don't know you know who you are. Middle class kid from Chicago, basketball player. Talk about your family and sort of how you grew up.

Well, I grew up in a working class neighborhood, working class kid. My father was an immigrant factory worker. My dad came from Yugoslavia after World War II. He spent four years in a Nazi prisoner of war camp. And then after the war, he spent three years in a refugee camp in Austria waiting for the United States Congress to pass a law called the Displaced Persons Act, which allowed him and millions of others like him with these long and hard to pronounce last names a chance to come to America. He came here eventually, met my mother, who was

fortunately for me, American born, because had she been from the old country like my dad, I think my first name would have been as hard to pronounce as my last name. I would have never been governor, but then again, I would have probably never been inmate number 40892424. But they were working people. My dad worked in a factory, a steel factory, a lot of other factories over the years. My mother was a working mom. She worked for the Chicago Transit Authority. She took fares and passed out transfers at the subway stations. They never owned a home. We were raised in a little five-room apartment, my older brother and I. And my parents were like parents everywhere. They worked real hard, sacrificed, scrimped and saved so that their kids can go to college. And my older brother and I had that opportunity because

of the hard work and sacrifice of our parents. So you went off to college and you did okay, went on to law school, stayed in Chicago, came back home and got a job for the Cook County DA's office. So you were a prosecutor first thing out of law school and practiced in the very same courthouses I practiced in for my first couple of years out of law school as well. I went back to Chicago. I was in private practice for, I don't know, two years there. Then went to New York, went back for another three years in Chicago. So I know the buildings in which you spent your formative legal career. And then as I see it, sort of the shifting point of your life, if you can pick the certain pivot points where

your future has changed. It was the meeting of your wife's father, right? Mr. Mel, tell us about that. Well, so I was a young prosecutor and I was just about to leave and go into private practice of law. And I was friendly with a judge and he was friends with my future wife's father. They were both young. They were both members of the Democratic Party. They were both young Democrats together coming up in the 1960s. You know, Chicago is a very political town. Judges are elected here. So judges need the support of political ward bosses. Patty's dad, my wife, Patty, her dad was one of the more prominent ward bosses in Chicago, old school Chicago politics. And the judge asked me if I'd be willing to, if I'd be interested in going with him to attend a fundraiser because he was trying to get the support of this ward committeeman, this ward boss,

Patty's dad. And I met Patty that night. It was a Sunday night, March 6th, Sunday night, March 6th, 1988. She was wearing a red dress and it was love at first sight on my part. It was not the same on her part. It was probably, you can argue the first political camp, not political campaign, because it was all about being genuine. But eventually she and I fell in love and we exchanged vows, joined hands and walked through life together. And Patty's been amazing, you know, through thick and thin. We've had a lot of good times, as you know, and we've had some calamitous times, as you know, and Patty's been there every step of the way. And she's just a wonderful person, a wonderful mother. I'm really blessed and fortunate. And I, I pitched myself. I can't believe she married me and I can't believe she stayed with me.

She did. She stayed with you all the time you were in prison raising your daughters. She comes off as a heroine in the documentary about you. And I liked her honesty. She admitted she was annoyed. She admitted when she definitely does not want you to run again for office if you can. And we'll get to her and your relationship a little later because I am very interested in it. And she it. She's a fascinating character. But her dad, so he was this sort of kingmaker in the ward in Chicago and decided you should run for office and you could be his guy. And Chicago's very elbow to elbow rubbing kind of politic world. It's not tough to make it if you don't know somebody.

You knew somebody and he decided to make a king out of you, right? So you spent time as a U.S. congressman. You were in the state assembly for a while in Illinois, and it was after your term as a U.S. congressman that you decided to go for the governor's office. Do I have my facts right? Well, that was the chronology, yes. And I would say that, you know, when I my opportunity came to run for office, it was more really about his politics. The political ward bosses, you know, they have a there's a certain stature if they have a state lawmaker who's connected to them. And without going into all the details of it, he was being outmaneuvered by some of the other ward bosses in the area. One of them, the most noteworthy, was former Congressman Dan Rostenkowski, who was a real political powerhouse in Washington for decades. And so they had a state lawmaker who was an incumbent who had been there for 12 years.

And my father-in-law was looking around for someone to run against that person. And it was me just because I happened to be in the family. I had this long and hard to pronounce last name. We had no really expectation that I'd even win. But we worked real hard. I was pretty good at it. And well, I won. And then we won in such a way where I think we caught the attention of some other people. And then I had a chance to be able to run for that very congressional seat that Dan

Rostankowski had since 1959. And then after that, well, I gave that up to run for governor. And then Rahm Emanuel, who's a noteworthy person, he ran for that congressional seat after me. Not just pretty good at it. You're amazing at retail politics. I mean, obviously, you ran into some criminal trouble and we'll talk about that. But as far as retail politics go, fewer better. I mean, you can see that. Anybody who's watched you on the campaign trail or on the stump, there is a natural ease that you have in speaking with crowds, in presenting yourself, in dealing with everyone from presidents to bus ticket takers. Have you always been like that? Did you grow up extroverted and popular and quick to make friends? You know, that's a good question. I don't know. You know, I, somebody asked me that question recently. And I think, I think part of that, you know, that sort of skill that you have in politics,

that it's a people's business. I might've learned that early on, you know, when I was a little boy, my first job was a nine years old shining shoes. I was shining shoes in the neighborhood and, and I shined shoes at this factory that my mother worked at before she worked for the transit authority. And I worked as a shoe shine boy after school every day between the ages of nine and 13. So I had four years of that. And in order to get to make money, in other words, to make tips, because that's how you really, you're not going to get rich being a shoe shine boy at nine years old, but the way you can do better and earn more money is to hustle around and earn tips.

And I'm not claiming to be the best shoeshine person out there. The quality of my shoeshines could have been better than they were, but I think I was pretty good while I was shining the shoes and maybe talking to the men who hired me and they'd give me a quarter for the shine. And most of the time I'd get a tip and maybe it goes back to that. I don't know. I was not exactly setting the world on fire in public school here in Chicago, but I did rise pretty high. And I guess I was, I do think I was pretty good at politics. I never lost an election. I won every one of them. They were all hard and

contested. The democratic primaries especially were very hard because those are hotly contested. You fight within your own party. So I think, yes, I guess I have to say that I had some skill at that. I was a lot better in politics than I was at algebra. That's for sure. Weren't you wasn't when you got elected, weren't you the first Democrat to be elected governor in something like 30 years in Illinois? Yes, that's right. I was the first Democratic governor elected in 26 years. And I was the first person statewide to be elected with these crazy long last names, right? So before I was elected, there were these sort of common anglicized Irish last names that are comfortable on the ballot for people to vote for. And the expectation was somebody with a name like mine could never get votes in the Southern part of our state, which is, you know, Southern Illinois is the American South. In fact, Carbondale, Illinois, you can reach Montgomery, Alabama faster from Carbondale, Illinois than you can reach Chicago. So people were saying, you know, he'll never be able to

get votes down there. And they said the same thing about Obama, but I'm not going to take credit for Obama's political success, but I will say that I was the icebreaker because when I was elected in 2002, somebody like Barack Obama with a different kind of a last name, I think he felt that, well, if a guy with a name like Blagojevich can win statewide, I can too. And of course he was right. So, yes, I was the first Democrat in 26 years. I had a lot of people helping me. The Democratic primary for governor was very hard. The Republican candidate that I ran against, the attorney general of our state, had very high approval ratings. He has a real compelling personal story and showed a lot of courage with how he handled some of his personal difficulties with his family, loved ones who he lost. But I was on the right side of history at that point. The Democratic nominee, whoever it was going to be, was going to possibly, probably ride the currents of history. I think Illinois was hungry for change. And so when I was able to win that primary, which was hard, I pretty much swam the currents to win in November and became the first Democrat. So they even had your campaign signs even showed people how to pronounce Blagojevich

with the blah-go-ye-vich, which now it seems easy, but when you actually watch it, when you look at it spelled, it does seem more challenging. Okay, so things were going swimmingly and you were climbing up the political ranks and you've married Patty, Mr. Mel,

Richard, Dick Mel's daughter, and you have two daughters of your own and things are going pretty well. Then, as I see it, the first real turn is something happened between you and your father in law. And he wanted you to do something. He didn't do it involving like a landfill in his ward. And man, things hit the fan. Explain that moment.

Yes, it was in December of 2004, spilling into January of 2005. I learned of a landfill he was involved in with some shady characters who had had some problems with the federal prosecutors years before. I was told by people in my administration and the Environmental Agency of Illinois that they were operating improperly outside of the law, that they were taking things that they weren't supposed to legally take. And so I had a tough decision to make. And it really wasn't tough. I mean, my public duty was I had to do something to make sure he complied with the law. The question was how you did it. And what I did was I chose to shut it down, which gave him an opportunity to go into court, make his case, remedy the problem. And the court

would order the landfill opened again for business, which is eventually what happened. I had some other options. I consulted with a lot of different people who sort of knew the dynamic and knew my father-in-law, who's a tough, rough and tumble political guy. And Chicago politics in many ways, those family connections, of course, you indicated that a moment ago are important, but you got to remember, I was not a blood relative. I was the son-in-law. And a lot of what he and I did were beneficial to both of us politically. It wasn't only an act of love from his part. In fact, I would argue there wasn't a lot of that in it. It was more practical politics. And so when I had to make

this decision on the landfill, threats were coming my way through third parties. He was conveying them to me because that's how these things work. I consulted with a lot of people on what to do. I felt deep down I knew what I was going to have to do, but I wanted to make sure I considered all the options. Rahm Emanuel was one of the people that spent some time with me in my campaign office discussing my options and advising me. And I made the right decision. I shut it down. The problem was Megan, of course, predictably was very angry about it and came out and called a press conference and then made an accusation that was false, that my top political fundraiser, who shares your last

name, his name was Chris Kelly, was trading board and commission appointments in exchange for $50,000 campaign contributions. Now that's a crime if you do a quid pro quo for a campaign contribution. And once he did that, he unleashed the furies and he knew he was smart enough in politics to know that that's precisely what would happen here in Chicago. And within a month, the federal prosecutors wanted to interview me. Now he retracted what he said under a threat of a lawsuit, said he had no information to believe any of that was true, but the damage was done. Once those furies are unleashed and those federal prosecutors put a target on you, boy, they're relentless, they're ruthless, they're remorseless, and they have unlimited power, unlimited resources, and the ability to try you over

and over again, even if they can't convict you the first time. Whatever happened with your relationship with him? I don't know. Is he still around? And did your relationship survive? Well, it was on hiatus for a long time, for many years. I was afraid of him after that. And it was very difficult for Patty, as you can imagine, very difficult for all of us because, well, he's my father-in-law. We have a lot of personal experience together. And in spite of it all, I love my father-in-law. So while I was still governor during the remaining years, which were another three, four, I kept my distance because I was frankly afraid he would try to hurt me again. And then when calamity came into my life, and you'll talk about that as we move along in this interview, I really didn't have any contact with him.

When I left for prison, I said goodbye and asked him, I hope you can be helpful to your grandchildren. And of course, he said yes, and he was. He's got a lot of real good qualities. Now, so after that hiatus, and I've been gone for all those years, eight years, just short of eight years, I returned home. He's 83 years old now. He's knocked on wood. He's doing great. You know, he was here for Christmas Eve.

He was here at our home for Thanksgiving. He carves the turkey just like he used to. And, you know, my Christian faith requires me to forgive, and I've forgiven him a long, long time ago. I don't think he intended what he started to end up the way it did. I think he caused, he wanted knowingly to cause me those problems. I think he wanted the feds in my life. I think he wanted me to feel the heat and the pain, but I don't think he wanted it to go as far as it did. And- He wanted limited legal trouble. He didn't want full blown legal trouble where you're facing prison, sentenced to prison for 14 years kind of trouble.

That's a that's a whole different kettle of fish to steal a term used by the Seventh Circuit. OK, so so so this is sort of what got the feds originally interested in you and your team and your advisors. Unbeknownst to you, they were more interested than than you knew. I mean, they started to really focus in on you. And we now know got federal wiretaps on you. I mean, you didn't know any of that. That's where I mentioned in the intro, they had hundreds of hours of wiretaps. It was 500 hours of tapes of you. And what was the first moment when that became clear to you like, oh shit, the feds have been taping me for years?

Well, that's great. It's a great question, Megan. Let me say this. I wasn't surprised that they were taping me. When I was having all those conversations, I figured it was very possible that they were, because I knew that they were chasing me and they were after me. And when you come out of Chicago politics, you just assume, even at the lowest level, that there's those elements. And so you hopefully want to be honest in the things that you do, but you talk on the telephone in a way where let the whole world listen to it, because what you're talking about, you know, is legal and you're acting in good faith. That's what there's always coming.

Wait a minute. Can I just ask you something, though? Because there's a moment on the tapes where somebody who works with you is telling you that I think the feds are taping everything and you do sound dumbfounded. You do not sound like a man who's like, I know that. I'm gooding everything and you do sound dumbfounded. You do not sound like a man who's like, I know that. I'm good. You sound like, uh-oh. Well, yes. I mean, when the realization hits you that they actually were taping, then you start, in your mind, you start thinking about, frankly, some of the nasty words you might've been saying.

I'm pretty confident, and we'll talk about the case if you want, as this unfolds, but I was pretty confident that everything I was talking about doing was legal. And I, to this day, insist that that's true. But I was worried about some of the things I may have said, the swear words. You know, I referred to Obama on some of those tapes in an unflattering way. Some other people in politics. Well, you knew that wasn't criminal. You knew that.

I mean, seriously, do you want people to believe that you were worried about the swear words you said or the not nice things about Obama versus possibly getting out, but whether or not you may have inadvertently crossed the line or said something that sounds worse than it is, of course, that's up crosses your mind, certainly does. But I think the bigger part of it was going forward, holy cow, it's like a reminder, they are really out to get you. And I learned the possibility that somebody who was real close to me was wearing a wire on me on the Friday before that I was arrested on Tuesday. And so that's a wake-up call as well, because it's just another indication that they are really determined to try to find something to get you on something. Coming up, we're digging into the infamous tapes and the concept of legal or illegal bribery.

I'm interested in sort of the human aspect of this story. I mean, did you have sleepless nights? Were you able to eat? Were you able to function? Like, what was that period like? Just that Tuesday to Friday, if you remember. Well, that Friday to Tuesday was, yes, that was a lot more troubling than maybe some of the earlier nights.

But some of the anger that's on those tapes, when you hear, I've heard myself on those tapes that have been played publicly. And by the way, Megan, let me just say this. You talk about hundreds of hours of tapes, and you're right, but they only played 1% of them. And to this day, I can't get them to play all those tapes. They wouldn't even allow me to play them in court to defend myself. And I suspect we'll probably talk more about the case, but I wanted every one of those tapes heard. I wanted the full context of those conversations

heard because they would show the real truth. Okay. But let me ask you something. I heard you say that a million times and we can get into the tapes and I have, you know, some of the more infamous excerpts. But if that look and I didn't read every single moment of the trial transcript or anything like that. But in general, I did practice a lot for 10 years. And if you had something that was exculpatory on those tapes, meaning led to, you know, finding of innocence, your lawyers would have played them. Your lawyers would have been able to get them in. The court would have allowed them in for completeness, if nothing else. You're telling me that there's some magic bullet in those tapes that never got played. Then your lawyers are terrible and you should have you should have filed an appeal based on ineffective assistance of counsel. Okay. Everything you just said there is absolutely right, except one thing. We asked for the tapes to be played at both trials, especially the second trial. I agreed to testify at the second trial on condition that we could play the tapes. And the judge said, yes, we could play the tapes to corroborate my testimony because I foresaw the real likely possibility that if I got up and testified

to a set of conversations that I had, and if those tapes weren't there, the prosecutor would do exactly what he did. And that is lie to the jury and tell the jury to go back to the jury room and listen to the tapes to see whether or not it corroborates with what I'm saying. The fact is, it's all in the court record. And the appellate court shockingly whitewashed it, didn't even address the issue that they wouldn't allow me to play those tapes. And they would not allow me to play those tapes. You're right. There is a thing called the rule of completeness. This is F and golden. I'm not giving it up for nothing. They will never allow me to play the rest of that conversation. They took snippets of conversations out of context and pieced them together. And even by themselves, those things don't constitute crimes.

You know what, though? Let's just jump to the, you know, cut to the chase that your alleged attempt to sell the vacant, the vacant Obama seat, Senate seat is not something that you were ultimately convicted of. I mean, that conviction didn't stand. That was thrown out. So if that's the thing that was going to, your tapes were going to exonerate you on, that point is moot. Except that I was in prison for four and a half years on that. And I'm still known for that, the so-called sale of the Senate seat. You know, I hope I don't die tomorrow. This is like a long, long list of things that you allegedly did wrong. Things that you were convicted of doing wrong. I too, for a long time, thought it was just the attempt to sell the seat. But there's a lot of stuff. They said that you did try for an

attempted quid pro quo on, and we can go through it. Correct. Yes. And there was no quid pro quo. But there was an attempt. That's what you were charged with, attempt. Right. I know. But in order to have attempt, you have to have evidence of an express quid pro quo. There never was that. In fact- No. You added the word express. That's not true. But it is. That's the McCormick case, 1991.en. No, I've read McCormick. Nineteen. Ninety one. That's not what it requires. And I read the Seventh Circuit case digesting McCormick in which you were appealing. And that's not right. Well, you're the host hostess of the show and you're a lot smarter than I am. But I have to tell you, I mean, I know where the line is. When

you ask for a campaign contribution and you don't promise or threaten anybody directly in exchange for that, that for that. That's legal. That's free speech. The Seventh Circuit made very clear in looking at your case on your appeal. Wink, wink, nod, nod is sufficient. No politician most wouldn't be dumb enough to be like, you've got to make a $50,000 donation to my campaign tomorrow. And then the day after tomorrow, I will give you I will approve the legislation that's going to help your racetrack, sir. Okay, by the way. Well, but the reality is, that's exactly how the system works. So for example, the big drug companies contribute

campaign contributions to United States senators, while they're voting on their things. Now, as long as there isn't, can I just tell you, I don't disagree with that. I don't disagree with that. Keep going. Right. Are you asking me, is the system a good system? No. Would you argue that it's legal bribery? Yes. I think you can argue that, but the line is very clear. In 2014, that Citizens United case, the Supreme Court reaffirmed that standard in McCormick, saying the only way you would limit compelling, the only compelling interest to limit free speech, because that's what fundraising is. They call it free speech, is so-called quid pro quo corruption. No one where the line was, we never promised anything, we never threatened anybody. They uphold those, upheld three fundraising requests where I received

nothing after they vacated the Senate seat. Right, attempt that you always say that I didn't get any money. And I agree that based on what I've read, you didn't. But that's not that's not relevant. That's a dodge. That's a red herring. If you attempted to get things, you attempted to get money in your coffers in exchange for your public duties. And that is illegal. And I'm not going to dispute with you that you were singled out and that a lot of people and your example of the drug companies is a great one. Very apt. They do buy favors all the time from politicians who are also corrupt. But that doesn't excuse what you did. Megan, I think the world of you and I want to talk, I hope we can. Of course, we can disagree. I don't hold it against you. I have no personal stake in this.

I'm just giving you the way I see it as a lawyer. Yes. But again, the law is you can ask for campaign contributions while something's pending, before something's pending or after something's pending, so long as you never promise anything or threaten anybody. I knew where that line was. I didn't cross it. They convicted me by moving the line at a second trial. The appellate court upheld it, I believe, because the political consequences were so significant, because someone's going down. Either I'm going down or those federal prosecutors, those corrupt federal prosecutors who did to me what they tried to do to President Trump, they would go down because they hijacked a governor twice elected by the people. That's my firm belief. And I know that the trial, if you were there and saw it,

if you read our appellate brief, and I wouldn't ask you to do it, you have too much more important things to do. But I knew where the line was. I knew they were chasing me. I wasn't that stupid. And they moved the line and I ended up going to prison largely because I fought back and I was defiant every step of the way, wouldn't take any deals that were being dangled in front of me. I mean, I get that's true. And I certainly believe that you did not foresee a conviction. Your behavior backs that up. But I will I have to be honest with my audience. I think they got you dead to rights. I think you did do it. I think you were singled out. But I mean, having watched a lot of the trial and covered it at the time as an attorney

and a journalist when you were going through it and then buffing back up on the whole case for this interview, they got you. I mean, they got you for an attempt. You didn't get the money because you were actually arrested before all the shit could go down. But you were striking deals. And I'll just give a couple of examples. These are a couple cited by the Seventh Circuit. But there was number one lobbyist for Children Memorial Hospital sought an increase in reimbursement rates for Medicaid patients. That's that was in your control as the governor. And you said you would approve an extra eight to 10 million of reimbursements in exchange for a, quote, campaign contribution of $50,000. And initially you approved that rate increase that they wanted. But then you rescinded it when you were waiting for the contribution. Then you got arrested before any money changed hands. Then there was another situation with the state legislature approving an extension of a program that taxed casinos and that tax would help racetracks. It was for the benefit of racetracks, which didn't do as well in

Illinois. But before you could sign the bill, you attempted to ensure that a guy named John Johnston, who owned interest in two of the racetracks, fulfilled a, quote, one hundred thousand dollar campaign pledge. And you had intermediaries, intermediaries informed Johnston that the bill would not be signed until your money arrived. And again, you were arrested before you could sign the bill and before he signed the check. Now, that is what the jury so found. Your defense was presented. They rejected it. The jury found that those facts, as I just read them, are true. That's it. That's that is unlawful behavior under Illinois and federal law. If those facts, as you recite them, were as you recited them, were true, that would be unlawful behavior. But there's a lot of do you do you dispute that that's what the jury found? Pardon me? Do you dispute that that is what the jury so found? No, no, the jury certainly did find it. And the jury found it because they didn't have to prove

a quid pro quo that where that was said that I asked for a $50,000 campaign contribution in exchange for the reimbursement to the doctors of the Children's Hospital. That's factually inaccurate. We were I agreed to send $8 million to the doctors of the children's hospital. That's factually inaccurate. I agreed to send $8 million to the children's hospital. That was a hospital that I cared a lot about. I did this because the head of the hospital called me. I was cutting $2 billion in increases in the state budget because I have a responsibility as governor to balance the budget. I told him that they would get the money after the first of the year because my budget people told me I'd be able to find $8 million to help them. Five days later, I asked my brother, who was doing fundraising for me, to see if they'll do a fundraiser for me

because they had raised money for me before. My brother made a polite phone call to the director, asked him, could you raise? I think he asked him for $25,000. And that was it. And the guy said, I don't know. And the prosecutor told the jury that that ask was the shakedown. That is not a crime. That is not the standard. And that prosecutor is a liar. So that's the facts on that case. The other one, and by the way, they got their money and I never got campaign contributions and I'm happy I didn't. Having said that, that horse racing one, I have 60 days to act on a bill. There were a lot of dynamics going on in state government that time. I was fighting with the Democratic House Speaker over all kinds of different issues. I found creative ways to use my executive authority as governor to rewrite some of their bills and make it work for people. Because I was doing that, he started doing things in the veto session

on some of my bills. And therefore, I was careful before I signed any bill. I said, it's on the tapes. I'm not going to act on any of these bills until I see them all together to see whether or not there's any shenanigans going on and people rewriting some of the laws that I'm for or not for. Long and the short of it is that horse racing bill was one of them. Nine days into it, I did nothing on it one way or the other. We were asking for campaign contributions from those people. They had contributed to me before. They had held a fundraiser for some of the state senators at the same time. I did nothing and never promised or threatened them. But anyway, the jury made the decision, I believe, because the jury instruction

was merely asking, even without a promise or a believe, because the jury instruction was merely asking even without a promise or a threat because they were not required to prove that was the crime. And so the jury made the right decision based upon the the unlawful standard that they were asked to judge me. That's what I mean. This is what you're saying. Yeah, no, I get it.

And listen, you're I think you're misreading McCormick. I think the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals agreed with me that the standard applied by the court was totally fine and that wink, wink, nod, nod is enough. It does not have to be explicit. That's not in the law. It's never been the law. It's requiring too much. There's a wider net that gets corrupt politicians for good reason. And the U.S. Supreme Court sided with the Seventh Circuit and the jury twice. So, I mean, they, they, they refused to get involved. You made these arguments and they were all rejected. So that's, that's the legal end of it. And I, I get it. Okay. So I've conceded to you that I think you were singled out, but I'm, I'm in no way going to miss me, mislead my audience that you're some victim who was wrongly convicted of doing something that you didn't do. Cause I think they, I, I'm just telling you, I think they got you and that's why you went to prison. So let's just jump back. Thank you, Megan. I did all those things. I said those things, but they're not crimes, other than some of the specific facts

they twisted and changed. So I appreciate your position. And I'm not going to convince you, I understand all that. And it's been a long, long time. And I'm not going to be able to undo that history. Hopefully, I'll do good works in the future to change my obituary. Well, look, you know, oh, you can't worry about that. You really can't. You can't think about that. I guess when you're a politician, you think about that stuff, but all you can worry about is living your life well, right. And being good to the people around you. And if you've done wrong, trying to do better, you know, every day thereafter. And as far as I can tell, you're doing that. I mean, I see a man now who is who really has nothing left to lose and who is trying to make the most of the time you have left, trying to be good to your family, trying to go back out to the

Chicago constituents and make friends and sort of build alliances. And I don't know what that's toward, but it's one of the very fascinating things about you, like whether there will be an act two in the political Rod Blagojevich. But let's let's hold that. I don't know what that's toward, but it's one of the very fascinating things about you, like whether there will be an act two in the political Rod Blagojevich. But let's hold that. I don't want to get to that yet. More with Blago coming up on the tape heard around the world. So, OK, let's go back to the trauma of this of this case, because I do want to talk about sort of the personal aspect of it. And I guess I should play the fucking golden because I know you're comfortable with it.

I've seen you do the the birthday phone calls saying it to people where they pay you 80 bucks for calling up. But this is the this is sort of the clip that got so much play. It's you talking about the open Barack Obama Senate seat and you're the governor. You get to fill it. And originally it was alleged that you were trying to, quote, sell the seat. I'm going to play the longer sound by the sound by one that gives a little of the lead up to the moment. Listen, I told my nephew, Alex, he just turned 26 today. I said, Alex, you know, I call for his birthday. And I said, it's just too bad you're not four years older. Because I could have given you a U.S. Senate seat for your birthday.

Yeah. You know what I mean? I mean, I've got this thing. And it's fucking golden. And I'm just not giving it up for fucking nothing. So that was the tape heard around the world. And the one that would become emblematic of the entire prosecution. And again, I should underscore for the audience that that that count did not live for a variety of reasons, even though I understand you were convicted on it, but it was thrown out ultimately by the Seventh Circuit. So, I mean, can you explain what was really happening in that moment? Because they were saying you're trying to sell the seat. And you say what? Well, I remember that vividly, of course, right?

I'm known for that. Real quick, if I could just tell you something. When I was teaching history in prison, that was my second job there. I was a tutor teaching Civil War history and World War II history. And I remember starting out my first class with my inmates. By the way, it sold out.

I had a full house of students. But I talked about how Abraham Lincoln is known for so many beautiful things that he said, with malice torn down with charity for all, four score and seven years ago, a house divided against itself cannot stand. Franklin Roosevelt is known for there's nothing to fear but fear itself. President Kennedy asked not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. President Reagan, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall. Obama, Barack Obama for hope and change me. This is up in gold and I'm not giving it up for nothing. So I'm stuck with

that. I'm known for that. Unfortunately, you know, I remember it all too well. And it was the day after the election, President Obama, President-elect Obama, historic, first time we elected an African-American president, I was the first governor to endorse him. We were all downtown Chicago for that historic event. It was a magical night. And a labor boss, a union guy by the name of Tom Ballenhoff came up to me backstage and said that, quote unquote, Barack called me last night. I was pumping gas. And he asked me if I'd come to you because he wants Valerie Jarrett to be the United States Senator. And I was asked to come and talk to you, see what you want. Can I call you tomorrow and set up an appointment? And I said, sure. So the very next day, Obama's president-elect,

and I went out jogging in the late morning. It was wintertime. It was November. It was right, the November 6th or something, Wednesday, came back. I remember I was still cooling down from the run, and I was laying on the floor in our family room, talking on the phone to one of my aides, and we were having that conversation that you just played, and then I said that, and I said that in the context of, we can make a a political deal here and let's see what we can get. And when I said I'm not giving this up or nothing, that was sort of in response to some people who were saying just give Obama whatever he wants. Don't make any deals. Just make him happy.

And my position was they offered to work something out. I wasn't just going to give it to him for nothing. So but whatever it was, was going to have to be legal. But that was that's sort of the centerpiece of pretty much all of my troubles. And when calamity came down like it did, like a whirlwind, that was the one tape that was played over and over again. And, you know, I'm known for that. Well, it's kind of interesting because what the court ultimately found was one politician And, you know, I'm known for that. That's not illegal that that's done. That kind of horse trading is done all the time by politicians who have different stakes in their minds on different positions.

And they were not prepared to recognize that kind of horse trading as a crime, which is I don't think much of the public knows. I think they hear that tape. They say, oh, that's wrong. If you're talking about trading one seat for another one position for an advancement on the political front, you know, in terms of a position, it's not as problematic as give me 50 grand and I'll approve this legislation that'll help you. That's now you're in much murkier waters. But as you point out that you're kind of known for this. And I wonder whether because, you know, my impression in reading the court papers is they make Obama and his team come out as squeaky clean. And I just wondered, are they squeaky clean? Or is it this is just a legal system that wants to portray Obama and his team as squeaky clean?

Like, we'll have nothing to do with him. We're not going to bargain. We're not talking to him. No. And I realize you were already sort of under investigation. They may have known that. But what's the truth? Well, no. My troubles on those tapes really began with that conversation and with the discussions about making a deal on the Senate seat. And they began taping me, I think, on the 30th of October. That conversation was maybe less than a week later. But you were under investigation for years prior to that, thanks to the whole Mel situation we discussed. I'm just saying maybe Obama was squeaky clean. And my question is, do you think he knew about the FBI investigation or maybe he really was squeaky clean? And they were like, we don't we don't cut deals like this. No, I'm so glad you brought that up because there's a fuller story behind the FBI investigations.

They were not only interested in me because of what Mel's accusation, my father-in-law's accusations were. There was a guy by the name of Tony Rescoe. I think you know the name. Yeah, that's how you first got, you were getting dragged into it over and over in the news. Yes. And Rescoe was very close to President Obama and very close to me, closer to Obama than to me. In fact, I met Obama through Resco. Resco was the guy that bought Obama the land next to the mansion that he bought after he was elected to the United States Senate. You may have some recollection of that. They were chasing Resco. Resco did some things that were wrong involving one of my agencies. I had nothing to do with any of that. But he was convicted

months before those FBI tapes went on me. My big fear was Resco. My fear was, were they going to try to threaten him and make him lie about me so that he gets a lighter sentence? And after he was convicted, he sent a letter to the federal sentencing judge saying that the federal prosecutors were trying to get him to lie about Senator Obama and Governor Blagojevich, both of us. And so Obama and I were both sort of toned up, if you want to talk in the street vernacular, and we had that problem politically. I believe, and I don't know that I can prove this, but I have a strong belief that a lot of my troubles were compounded by the fact that the Obama political apparatus

was dumping Resco on me. And it became, he was more my problem than Obama's problem. He was running for high office, be president of the United States. The media treated him in a way that was unusual. I think they were very kind to him. And I was stuck wearing Resco more than Obama. But when he sent that letter to the sentencing judge, it seemed like my troubles were over and his were as well. But then we had the problems with those telephone calls. And then we had election night. And then the guy came to me to make the deal.

So if you're asking me, do I feel like Obama was more pristine than me? The answer is no. Now, you disagree with my characterization of what happened to me on the cases, but I firmly believe Obama and I were pretty much following the same routine practices in politics and government. And then when my troubles came, politically, Obama saw the problem for him and decided to allow me to sink or swim on my own and went his own way to protect himself. Politics is a rough and tumble business. It's very understandable, very predictable. And I think he was protecting himself politically. And I was left pretty much on a sinking ship. The Titanic was going down.

I was the captain of the ship and everybody else jumped off of it. That's how I interpret what happened with Obama. And I think that's why among the reasons why he when he had an opportunity to actually do what President Trump ultimately did, he chose not to do it. Okay, so that's fascinating, because he did have the chance to commute your sentence. And just so the audience understands, a pardon is when they basically wipe away the crime altogether, and you no longer have to say that you were a convicted felon. But a commutation is basically you've suffered enough. I'm ending your prison term now, notwithstanding what the what the sentence was. And that's what Trump gave you, a commutation. And your family had asked President Obama for a commutation. And your young daughter wrote this,

you know, heart wrenching letter. Your whole family had pushed for him to give you a commutation first time around. No. Okay. Then he gets reelected. Now he's safe, right? You can't, you can't be president three times in a row. So he's in a second term. So now they go back to him and say, now, now can we have it still? No. And your daughter wrote him a scathing letter after he rejected it saying, you know, you're, you're pardoning FALN terrorists. Like you're, you're issuing pardons and commutations of people who have committed violent crimes, but you're not going to shorten the sentence of my dad who at this point, you know, you'd been in prison about five or six years, I guess. What did you make of that? Well, it was six and a half years by then. And well, there's a couple of things.

First of all, we didn't ask him for the commutation only one time. We didn't ask him before his reelection. Oh, okay. I understood his politics and I wasn't going to even remotely think about asking for that at that time. I was pretty much stuck. And frankly, Megan, I thought I'd get relief from the courts and I was able to get partial relief, but not what I fully expected and was hoping for.

I was fearful I wasn't going to get it. But what I felt I was entitled to, having said all of that, there I was six and a half years into it. And I understood and recognized President Obama's political situation because he's involved in my case. And so rather than ask him to just let me go home when he's leaving Washington in January of 2021, we asked him to just cut the sentence in half from 14 years to seven years. My sentence is higher than anybody's. Unlike everybody else who was a governor, I never did take a penny. It was politics. It wasn't personal corruption. I mean, it's those fundraising issues that you're talking about. And that I had done more time in prison. Well, no one's ever done time in prison, a politician, for only fundraising infractions alone. There's always something else. So we thought we had a very strong case from a standpoint of fairness. And I also had the opportunity because I've been blessed and fortunate. Unlike a lot of my other

colleagues, 151,000 other federal inmates, I was probably one of the only ones who could actually get his paperwork before the president of the United States. So I was fortunate and lucky that way. And David Axelrod, he used to work for me, was very close to President Obama. He was his media consultant, was actually delivering those letters that my daughters wrote to President Obama, same age as his two beautiful young daughters, and asking him, joined by Democratic members of Congress from Illinois and others who I knew in politics, urging him to not send me home when he goes home, but cut my sentence in half to seven years. And therefore, when he leaves the White House, you know, on the high, the big house. Yes, I'll limp out of the big house six months later or eight months later in October. So this way, it wouldn't be politically embarrassing to him or change the messaging from a media point of view. And when he decided to allow the FAL and terrorists, and then a woman by the name of Chelsea Manning, who used to be Bradley Manning, who was convicted of treason, when he let them out, I thought our chances were pretty good that

I might actually finally get to go home. But he passed me by. And then moments after that, maybe the day or so after I'm sweeping floors, that was one of my jobs in prison, the many jobs I had. One of my colleagues came up to me. They called me Gov in prison. And he said, hey, Gov,, uh, Amy, right? She's your older daughter. Uh, I did not refer to you as Mr. President this time. That's because you've lost my respect. You've broken my heart once again, and you've betrayed the concept of justice, just like many other heartless individuals have done before you. I thought you were different. I thought you had a moral compass. Turns out you're just like the rest, selfish and spineless. And she goes on to to say you didn't have to pardon him only commute the sentence um and and said she says i i want more than anything to have faith but i don't think i know how if there was a god and all powerful all good and all knowing god my family would not have had

to endure this trauma it really makes me feel for her i feel like it makes me mad at you it makes me feel for her. I feel like it makes me mad at you. It makes me a little mad at Barack Obama. I mean, certainly no one would argue that she did anything wrong. Yeah, I mean, you know that. You know that illegal or not illegal or just questionable or on the line, God, you did cause her a lot of trauma. That's got to be tough to shoulder. Well, that's the hardest part of it, what happens to your children in something like this and what they've gone through, both of them,

our little girls. Amy's 25. She would have been back in 2017, she would have been 20, right? And then our younger daughter, Annie, she's 18. She was eight years old when I left home. So I didn't really see her grow up. But they both have endured a great deal. Now, Patty's done a wonderful job raising them by herself. Both are my little ones at a real good college. And my older one graduated from a real good college. She's in graduate school now. You know, she's a very, her politics is sort of like AOC politics. So when she writes that letter to Obama, that's coming from a Bernie Sanders voter, right? But no, the hardest part of that is what happens to your children. And I had all that time in prison, 2,896 days to do a lot of thinking and reflecting. And I would try to discipline myself

and stay strong because I had to be strong for no other reason for them and for my wife. But I would have moments late at night sometimes. I'd look through the window. My home was a six foot by eight foot prison cell for the first 32 months. I'd look through the window and I'd follow the light of a passing plane flying overhead and imagine myself on that plane with my kids and my wife going anywhere as long as I wasn't where I was. But I would also ask myself, was I too caught up in the pride fighting back the way I was? I still am, as you see. Should I have just cut my losses for them? Because I think I probably could have gotten 18 months, two years. They were floating that after they failed to convict me at a first trial. And I just wouldn't even hear of it because I was so certain that I was on the right side of the

line and didn't do anything wrong. I was certain, still am, that those are corrupt prosecutors and they belong in prison. So I couldn't give in, and yet my kids are suffering and are hurt. To this day, they have wounds. And yeah, you ask yourself, did you let your pride get in the way of falling on the sword for your children to make it easier for them, less hard for them. I still ask myself that. I don't know that I have the answer. There is footage in Being Blago of you on the day you had to go to prison, leaving your family. Oh, I have to tell you, that was hard to watch and obviously much harder to actually live. I want to ask you about that and about about saying goodbye, about what prison was like, about the Democratic Party

today and why you call yourself a Trumpocrat. Certainly after his commutation, that was more likely, but you've known each other for a long time. Going to pick it up there, squeeze in a quick break and so many more interesting places to go with Rod Blagojevich. Don't go away. One thing I wanted to circle back to on the whole legal dealings was the person who the newly elected Obama administration allegedly wanted to go into Obama's old seat, at least so far as you were told, was Valerie Jarrett. And something interesting came out in the course of the trial, or at least what I read in the transcripts, was you had been told by Rahm Emanuel that's who Obama wants. He wants you to appoint Valerie Jarrett, Valerie Jarrett. And you

weren't all that excited about her. And then it turned out that it wasn't Obama who wanted you to appoint Valerie Jarrett to that Senate seat. Tell us what the real story was. Well, I'm not sure that I know exactly what the real story was. I know a lot of people seem to think, and I would include myself in that. It's really hard to say because, you know, as an attorney, and you clearly know a lot about the criminal law, there's these things called 302s when the FBI will take, will interview people and they write these 302s, FBI interviews, state witness statements. And they took the witness statement of President-elect Obama. And the defendant, being me, is entitled to get all of the evidence that's relevant to his or her defense, including witness statements from

people who are relevant. President Obama was central to this because he began the conversations on the Senate seat by sending an emissary to me to make a deal. To this day, we still haven't been able to get those 302s. They won't give it to us. We couldn't use those as part of my defense at both trials. And there may be a contradiction between the testimony of the union boss that I talked about, the guy by the name of Tom Valinoff, who at two trials testified that Obama sent him to me to approach me about Valerie Jarrett and that he wanted to come and see me and that we would then discuss that issue. Obama denies that publicly.

When all of this was swirling in the very beginning of the storm, he was asked about whether he had ever did that, and he said no. Now, what he says on the 302s, which is, as you know, if you lie to the FBI, that's a crime. So what he says on those 302s, we don't have the answer. Did he contradict himself? Did he contradict his public statement? Or did he corroborate his public statement? If he corroborated his public statement- Wasn't there something, Rod, about, at least according to the transfer I read of you in 2008,

saying it was actually Rahm Emanuel who wanted Valerie Jarrett. He was saying it was President Obama, President-elect Obama, but really it was him. It was Rahm Emanuel who wanted her there because he was looking to eliminate a rival from the White House. He wanted her turfed over to this temporary Senate seat and was sort of representing, oh, this came from Obama. Meanwhile, it was good old Rahm, dead fish, Emmanuel. That's my belief. And that's why I think we can't get the President Obama's 302s. No, I think this could very well have been Rahm that engineered the whole thing precisely by the motivation you indicated, which is to be closer to the king. And Michelle Obama and Valerie Jarrett are very, very close. I think Rahm saw a rival in the White House

when it came to the ear of the president, and he wanted to be closer to the king. And best way to do that was to kick Valerie Jarrett upstairs and put her in the United States Senate and therefore came to me to do that. That's what some people believe. I tend to think that happened, but I don't know for sure. I know what that union boss told me. Pardon me? You knew him a long time, Rahm Emanuel, as you pointed out earlier. What do you think of him? Well, he's a real hardworking guy. He's really smart. He's really tough. He's very ruthless. And he would stab you in the back if he could, if it served his interests. So I actually had a good relationship with him and worked well with him. And there's a part of me, I know I'm going to kick myself for saying this,

that there's a part of me that I kind of like about him because he's a guy who's part of what Teddy Roosevelt called the fellowship of the doers. He gets things done. And a lot of people in politics don't. They just give speeches and promises they can't keep or don't intend to keep. He's actually a guy who can get things done. So it was good when I was in politics with him because I could rely on him to actually do things. He's very smart, very political. He's got good political instincts. I would say he's overly, he's too political. But in spite of that, he's also a ruthless guy. And do I think he would sell me out in a heartbeat if it benefited him politically? Of course I do. But I knew that even before this happened. Much prefer the ones who will stab you in the front. Honestly, the same is true in media. Much rather get stabbed right in the front. And to be honest, like having worked at a bunch of places, that's how Fox News will do it. They'll stab you in the front and they'll stand there and they'll wait for your response. And that's the way it ought to be done. I wish I could say the same for network news, which is much more fascinated with stabbing you in the back.

Or I think the saying is like, somebody once said to me something like, CBS will stab you in the front, ABC News will stab you in the back, and NBC News will just walk away as you collapse into a bloody heap. Not put their fingerprints on it. Yeah, you know, my heart goes out to you.

I watched that unfold when I was gone. I want to say this real quick, Megan, about you, because, you know, there I was in November, December 2016, President-elect Obama, I mean, President Trump just won, historic. I was telling all of my inmates he was going to win, and I wouldn't go into that or not go into that, but I hadn't watched you on television because I had been gone all those years, and then when my troubles came, I wasn't watching any of it. And so I discovered you and you were being interviewed on Fox TV with some of your colleagues.

You were just leaving to go to NBC and you were taught, you were promoting a book called settle for more. And you talked about your personal story with your father, losing your dad. And it was really moving to me. And I was inspired by your story, embrace adversity to send my daughters your book. And I remember calling vividly, calling my wife on her nightly calls. They limit you on the time you can talk. Urging her to find whatever money I might have left somewhere because I wanted to buy

my two daughters your book for Christmas because they were little girls who lost their dad. But unlike you, your dad wasn't going to come home. They had a chance for their dad to come home. But look what you made of yourself and how you fought through the adversity. You're an inspirational figure. No, I really did this. Thank you. And they got those books. Oh, I'm going to send them a signed copy now.

They can throw that copy away. I'll send them a signed copy, both of the girls. And that is one of the blessed things about having received a commutation is now, I get that you missed the graduations, but like you didn't, you didn't miss the walking down the aisle, right? Like you didn't, you didn't miss the grandkids. Like all those things can still happen, not just for you, but for them, right? It's the family too, that suffers. Your daughters are innocent. This was the second most severe sentence ever handed down at the federal level for timeline. Okay. So it's December 9th, 2008,

when you get arrested and coughed, let's not blow back that by that, that that's gotta be, I don't know. I mean, like of the, of like getting a, finding out about the wire tabs,

getting arrested and coughed. And then of course getting convicted, which, which of those moments stands out to you the most. And don't forget the sentencing when they say you're going away for 14 years. Don't forget that. Yes. Who could forget that? That's a body blow, right? Well, it was all, I mean, you asked me to pick my poison. They were all bad. So I'm a sitting governor and they're corrupt prosecutors. I know you disagree with me.

They are so dirty and so rotten and so corrupt. Some of the same people who did to me what they tried to do to President Trump using the same playbook. So they came to my house at six o'clock in the morning. I'm a sitting governor. But can I say just with respect, what what happened to President Trump? I actually do think was wrong. I don't I don't think they had the grounds to impeach him or, you know, I don't certainly not that first time. And I think the grounds they came after with him on the second time were trumped up. And they actually if they were going to object about that whole thing, they should have objected to the amount of time he waited before he sent in any help. Anyway, that's just my my thumbnail. But I can see when it is trumped up and when it isn't. But I don't want to the way. So I get a phone call. I was going to run that morning. I had my running clothes laid out because that psychologically helps you get out in the cold early in the morning. I'm the governor at the time, and I've got security detail around my

house. They're always with me. And the phone rings. The alarm clock was set for six. The phone rang a little before the alarm clock. I answered the phone. And it was one of my security guys saying, Governor, we have the FBI here. They have a warrant for your arrest. And I was just waking up. So I was sort of like not altogether as aware as you are when you're fully awake. And I remember saying, come on, Jimmy, stop effing around. And Jimmy is Jimmy DeLeo, a state senator from Illinois, was a close friend and ally from Chicago, who is a real likable guy, likes to play practical jokes. I thought he was messing around with me. And then my security detail guy said, oh, no, no, governor, this isn't Senator DeLeo, this is agent so-and-so. And hold on a second, I'll put them on the phone.

And in fact, it was the agent first. And then the security guy got on to confirm that the agent was in fact there. And then they rush you and they say, hurry up, let us in, let us in. And so we let them in, Patty and I, our little girls were sleeping upstairs in bed. And our little Annie, when this happened, was five years old. They were both going to have to go to school in an hour. But fortunately, they were able to get me out of the house. I mean, I got ready fast and left well before our daughters woke up to not have to be a part of that. And then they handcuffed me. That's another thing. It was all shock and awe designed

to break my will to resist and give in and create this media firestorm that was inevitably going to happen. There's no reason to cuff you. Yeah. And they had SWAT teams around my house, which is completely ridiculous because the only reason you arrest people are twofold. Number one, he or she is a threat to the community, a danger to the community. Number two, he or she might run away. Well, I'm the sitting governor. So they did this all for public relations and to prejudice the public against me. And I think they felt that I was going to give in and that they would bring so much down on me that I'd have no choice but to give in. I think they were surprised that I fought back. I think that explains the 14-year sentence, because I think, frankly, anyway. So that's how

it was that morning. They took me into custody. In the beginning, they were very nice to me. They were saying, you're not a bad guy. You're a product of Chicago politics. We listened to all your calls. It was the good cop routine. You can help us with other people.

And I interpreted that to mean they wanted me to talk about Obama. Because the way they operate is they don't ask the guy that they're squeezing or putting pressure on to talk about somebody in a lower position. They want him to go higher. And nobody's higher than a governor. They weren't looking for me to talk about aldermen in Chicago. They wanted me to talk about somebody higher than a governor. And nobody's higher except the president.

And Obama was instrumental in those phone calls because he sent someone, allegedly, to me about the sale, about the sale, about the Senate seat. So when I told him, look, I did nothing wrong and I'm not going to talk about me or anybody. Then their mood changed and they transported me to the federal court building, which you're familiar with because you practice law in Chicago, 219 South Dearborn, which is my least favorite place in the whole universe, not just the world. I hate that spot. And they put me in this cell, which is really small and tight. And then they, this was all by design too, to psychologically screw with you, which I knew. And they had me next to a guy that was very angry, all hyped up on PCB, very violent. And he was in the cell right next to me, but the window was open that

separated us. So he was MFing these guys back and forth, pacing the small little space he had. I decided to do some pushups in there so that I could write in my book, which I did, that I did pushups in there. And then we were arraigned about 1.30 in the afternoon, my chief of staff and I, and my chief of staff, I hadn't seen all day, but I learned that day that they arrested him too. Then he used to work for Mayor Daley, Megan, you remember Mayor Daley, right? Sure, of course. And funny because a couple of weeks before that, we were on a flight coming back from Springfield and we were just talking and I asked him, let me ask you a question. His name is John Harris. Who

was harder to work for, me or Mayor Daley? And he had told me, oh, you're so much easier to work for the Mayor Daley. You know, he gets angry. He yells, he puts pressure on you, blah, blah, blah. You're a breeze compared to Mayor Daley. So unbeknownst to both of us at the time, we're not foreseeing what's going to happen in a few weeks. There we are. I hadn't seen him all day. He's waiting outside on the door on the other side of the courtroom where we're about to be arraigned, where we expect a media frenzy, which was exactly what happened. And I see him briefly as we're waiting for our case to get called. And I said to him, hey, John, I have one question for you. Now let me ask you, who's harder to work for me or Mayor Daley?

And needless to say, he laughed nervously. And I think it was pretty obvious. It's harder to work for me. Yeah. At least didn't get dragged into federal court on criminal charges for Daley. So, but one thing I noticed watching the documentary is in, in, when you get dragged in front of the cameras for when you were arrested and during the trial and so on, what I saw was a man who loves the camera. You the circumstances were difficult, but you are like a moth to the flame when the press is around. You did not look like somebody who's like, I hate these piranhas. You're like, I still love you. And don't you still love me? And the poor, you know, they're coming after me. And like, it seemed to me like

you always felt like if I can just get through to the people directly, if I can just speak to the people, I will convince them to drop this. Well, I think there's an element of truth to that. Yes, I think that's part of it. I don't know if that was part of a concerted plan necessarily. It was more. I think it plan necessarily. It was more- I think it's instinct. It seems like your genuine emotion. Yeah. I think that's right. Look, again, you're going to disagree with me, but I know. I just know in my heart, I didn't do anything wrong and I knew what those people were doing. You didn't do it. I got it.

I know. So I'm sorry. So I'm fighting back, but I see what they're doing. They put a court seal on the tapes within days of my arrest, which means I couldn't get those tapes out and defend myself. I saw that a lot of some of the other stuff they were doing. And so my only recourse was, I felt, was to somehow reach the people. And when you're innocent, if you believe you're innocent as I know I am, you want to shout from the highest roof, I didn't do it. And so whenever there was a camera, whenever there was an opportunity for me to get out there and express my, what I believe, what I know the truth to be, I did it. You're right. And against the advice of a lot of my attorneys who said, you're just going to piss off the judge and down the road here, these guys have so much power to going to get you. You're going to have to answer for this one day. But I felt like this was my only recourse.

And well, some people that are trying to poison the jury pool, you know, which is what a lot of people do in a criminal trial, you know, defense. And in the first trial, indeed it, they were deadlocked on all of the counts,

but one, they found you guilty of lying to the FBI earlier on in connection with the Resco thing, but they were not able to reach a verdict on all the other counts. And I don't know that that was jury nullification, but I'm just saying clearly the jury wasn't convinced about your guilt. And I don't know that that was jury nullification, but I'm just saying clearly the jury wasn't convinced about your guilt. And then of course the prosecution said, we're, Oh, we will be retiring, trying him. And they did. And they, they secured a conviction

on 20 counts. So you, you go in now. And actually I should, should I back up? Because the retrial didn't come until 2011. But back in 2010, okay, so January 9th, or 2008, December, you're arrested. January 9th, the Illinois legislature impeaches you. You get thrown out of office. April 2009, you get the official charges, racketeering, extortion, et cetera. Then spring of 2010, right before your trial started, you went on Celebrity Apprentice. Why? When you get arrested like that and you have that problem, you become a leper. And the people that know you and did work with you don't want to go near you because they don't want to catch what

you have. And that's very natural. It's human with you don't want to go near you because they don't want to catch what you have. And that's very natural. It's human nature. It's understandable. Nor do you want to get them caught up in anything. So you're isolated. My wife, Patty, was working as an executive director for a homeless organization doing great work. She had a contract.

But when I was arrested, they terminated her contract. Now, we could have probably sued. But how do you sue a homeless organization, right? And I was thrown out of office, as you say. It wasn't January 9th. That was the House impeachment. I was thrown out later in the month, later in January in the Senate. But we were both out of work, and neither one of us had any income. We have a mortgage to pay here. I didn't get rich in the business. And so you're looking for a way to earn a living pending the trials. And it's interesting, Megan, I was typecast as such a scoundrel that in the early stages, again, nobody wants to do anything with you in the ordinary course

of things. But the one world, Megan, where there's some interest, ironically, is the entertainment world. And I never really gave much thought about any of that. I never watched reality television. I had met Donald Trump a couple of times before, only briefly. I never watched his show, but I was typecast as this scoundrel. And so I was getting offers that I was turning down. For example, I was offered six figures to be a greeter on an HBO show about a house of prostitution in Henderson, Nevada called the bunny ranch. Oh my gosh. Can you imagine? Right. And I could have used the money, but I just couldn't do that. I have two young daughters.

I'm not doing that. And then I was invited to go out to a game show network. There's a place in Santa Monica where they have all these game shows that are on different cable television networks, apparently. And they wanted, they had a perfect spot for me to be some guy who would go around with a camera and catch men cheating on their wives and then put the camera on them. And then I'd say, Hey buddy, what do you think? She caught you. And, uh, I felt, I said, look, I don't, I'm not comfortable doing that. I asked, I said, do you have a show where you got a pretty girl who spins a wheel? And I asked trivia questions. I feel like I could do that. And they said, we don't see you that way.

We see you more as this other guy. So I turned that one down. And then something wholesome came around. There were two of them. One was called, I'm a celebrity. Get me out of here, where they put you in the jungle in Costa Rica. And you got to eat tarantulas and do other things to get out of the jungle. And the public votes to keep you on or off.

It was at NBC, by the way. And the prosecutors objected to me doing that because it required me. I didn't have a passport and I'd have to go to Costa Rica. NBC offered to pay for U.S. marshals. I'm a celebrity. Get me out of here. That could have been the lower third on any show I did while at NBC, but keep going. Well, anyway, so I couldn't do it, but because we were in such dire straits financially, and I was so notorious at the time, evidently I was good for ratings. They wanted my wife, Patty. And Patty did it for our family. And so, and America liked her. She made it to the final four. So she was on for the whole month, Monday through Thursday on NBC Live television. I like her, too. I like her, too. You only you only need to hear an interview or two with Patty. And you're like, I like her. I'm a little worried about the state of your marriage. But but only because of the things that you expressed on camera. And she did as well. So, OK, so you go on Celebrity Apprentice, you meet Donald Trump. I know you'd met briefly years before, but you get to know Trump. And, you know, one thing you can't deny about President

Trump is he is a television genius and he understands what works on television. He does in a way that few, few others do. So you go on. It worked out OK. He did fire. He fires most people. And here was the moment just for people who are curious. This is sound by eight.

Well, actually, Aaron was telling me that Rod had certain difficulties with elements of technology. Yeah, that that's definitely what I heard. I can understand you are a little nervous about using the phone, but they seem to go a little bit beyond that. But you couldn't email, so you couldn't really say what you thought because you didn't want to lead it here.

And what was Rod doing? Well, it couldn't be that bad. Uh-oh. I mean, I'm just asking sort of an innocent question, I think. Rod was napping. Napping? Yes. All right.

Maybe that's not so bad. No, it's not so bad, but I was working. With all due respect to Salida, Winston Churchill said you can take one day and make it a day and a half if you make a judicious use of your time in the middle of the day. And then, frankly, I did have my sunglasses on,

so maybe my eyes were open. I have great respect for you. I have great use of your time in the middle of the day. And then frankly, I did have my sunglasses on. So maybe my eyes were open. I have great respect for you. I have great respect for your tenacity, for the fact that you just don't give up. But Rod, you're fired. Who would know? possibly have known at that point in 2010 that 10 years later you would be in prison, he would be in the White House, and he would return to you your freedom. It's mind-blowing. Yes. Is that a question? Yeah. Is it mind-blowing for you? It's not like you knew. It's not like you went on Celebrity Apprentice because you were like, oh, that guy's going to be president

one day. Things are going south for me with the law right now. You couldn't possibly have known. So I mean, just the series of events that would wind up, you know, returning to you as a result of that stint. It's pretty extraordinary. The unlikely convergence of events and President Trump being the instrument is the hand of God. I firmly believe that. Now, I had all those days in prison, 2,896 days to do several things like catch up on my reading. And I did a lot of reading and I read the Bible in ways, and I'm not here to proselytize my Christian faith to anybody else, but I read it in ways because I was so alone and so yearning for home and brokenhearted that the only comfort I could find was the Bible. And I read it in a way

where I didn't feel rushed. I didn't feel like I had to go and do other things so I can get ahead in life. I just read it and read it over and over again. And I feel like I have so much of a better understanding of the word of God and what he wants and expects from us. And I look back on all of that, like you say, and it had to be, it had to be divine us. And I look back on all of that, like you say, and it had to be, it had to be divine intervention. And I'm always going to be grateful to President Trump. I love President Trump. I'm a Trumpocrat for reasons beyond just what he did for me. But no, I agree with you, Megan. It was something that was extremely improbable, unlikely, unpredictable, and an unusual convergence of events. And never in my wildest dreams when I was doing that show, and that scene that you just showed when he fired

me was October 2009. Never in my wildest dreams am I thinking ahead that he's ever going to be the president of the United States, much less get into politics. Up next, what life was like for the former governor of Illinois in prison. All right, so let's go back to the beginning of that almost 3,000 days. And you get sentenced, you've got to go off to prison. There's the tape of you leaving your family because of the news. It was like the Paris Hilton arrest. I mean, it was a crazy amount of press following every move. I know you say in the documentary you had made a resolution not to turn back. Oh, after you hugged your daughters and your wife, you would resolve not to look back

after that moment as you're getting into the car. Tell us about that. Well, that was the day that I dreaded and thought a lot about for a long time leading up to the day, the morning that I left for prison, which was early in the morning. It was about 5 or 5.30 in the morning on the 15th of March, 2012. It was a Thursday. And I had been sentenced. I think it was Pearl Harbor Day, December 7th, 2011. The judge gave me 14 years. And so I knew the date that I was going to have to leave home and report.

It's called self-surrender. And Patty and I spent time discussing how we were going to handle this because we wanted to do this in the best possible way for our little girls. And like I said earlier, my younger one was eight years old and our older one was 15, so sophomore in high school. So Patty had us see a child psychologist to kind of work through the days leading up to my departure, things that we should do together as a family before I go away for a very long time. And part of that too, was Patty and I sort of war gaming what that morning is going to be like when I say goodbye. And me personally, I spent a lot of time thinking about that and dreading it and fearful that it would be heart-wrenching for my children.

And so my philosophy was that we should try to be as upbeat and positive and cheerful as we possibly can be, which meant that I had to lead by example and had to put on a brave face, even though inside I was dying, as you can imagine. And so, you know, the night before Patty, she made my last supper, which was my wife's, my mother had my favorite recipe for spaghetti that my mother used to make me, my late mother, that she taught Patty before she passed away. So Patty made me that, but I didn't taste were in the foyer area, right by our front door. A couple of my lawyers were at the home already. Two of them were going to fly out to Colorado with me. And the media was with me every step of the way, as you correctly said,

including a helicopter following me from my home to O'Hare Airport in Chicago. And then one picking me up in Denver from the Denver airport, as I right into the moment that I crossed the threshold and left the world, the real world to enter that world that I would spend nearly eight years in. So they're all out there in front of my house and it was time to say goodbye. And I planned this in my own mind and replayed it over and over again, how it was going to go and how I needed to be strong and all the rest. And I'd been determined that, you know, we would embrace and kiss and say goodbye. And then I would walk out the door and be, and steal myself to not look back at them because I didn't know that I could handle it.

And, and so I got, you know, we did all of that. And my little one came down and she was in her pajamas and, you know, she hugged me and squeezed me, you know, just kissing her on the top of her head. And, um, and then I had to leave the embrace and walk to the door. And, and then I did what I shouldn't have done. And I looked back and one last look back, one last blown kiss to my kids and my wife and then out the door. And there was all that media, you know, so they don't give you time to, you know, consult with your emotions, which probably was a good thing. It made you stay strong.

So I had to face the media, which was in a weird way, maybe a blessing because it prevented me from, you know, maybe giving into the emotion and maybe breaking down, which I couldn't let myself do. But it's a moment I'll always remember, of course. I would say that and holding my mother's hand when she was passing away, I would say those were the hardest moments I've ever had in my life. I can't imagine. I cannot imagine things much harder than that.

I have an eight-year- old and kissing him goodbye and knowing that it's going to be 14 years before I can hug him again, hold him and all the things I'm going to miss, you know, thinking, I mean, it wound up being almost eight, but it's still a long time. And when you left, you thought it was gonna be 14. You thought she was going to be 22, that you would have missed the entire thing. It's just, that is devastating. And I'm sure, I mean, when your daughter writes of trauma, she means it. Well, yes.

And as I said before, the worst part of it all is, is the impact that has on your children. And, uh, and then I replay, you know, the things that I did or didn't do should have done differently, my pride and all of those other things that go into it, you know, the things that I did or didn't do should have done differently. My pride and all of those other things that go into it, you know, but, uh, but your wife, Patty, not only did she go on to raise your daughters, but she stood by you and she didn't file for divorce or try to find a new husband who could be present, you know, for the bulk of the upbringing of your daughters. She stood by you. She's one of the reasons why you got the commutation. She ultimately went on Fox News and through this guy who worked for the Trump administration, helped you with his op-ed and basically went on a full campaign once Trump was president to get the commutation. And thanks in part for sure to her, you got it

with some smart strategy. But let's talk about what it was like in prison, because not everybody like you has been to prison. And I have to imagine it wasn't glamorous. It was federal prison, right? Because it's federal crimes in Colorado. So did you have a roommate? What were the inmates like to you? Well, I'm the only governor on a lot of stuff, including the only one to be put in a higher security prison. So my first 32 months, I was in what the inmates call the prison behind the razor wire. That's the barbed wire fence. And you can't go near that fence because if you do, there are prison guards there armed with machine guns who have the discretion to shoot you. And there were about 950 guys there. There were all kinds of drug dealers, cartel members, gangbangers, Sudeños, Notenhos, Crips and Bloods, Aryan Nation, racist white guys, Pacific Islander gangs, Native American

gangs. And the gangs are important because they encourage segregation of the groups of people. They want to keep them separate within that kind of prison world. There were murderers there, bank robbers, con artists. Of the 950 guys, maybe there was about 2%, me being one of them, that were so-called white collar. In other words, business crimes or things of that sort. Of course, I'm the only governor there. And my home for that time, for a lot of that time, was a little cell, six foot by eight foot prison cell cell four cement walls a big heavy iron door that can shut you in small window with bars on it a bunk bed uh for two

well i'm on the top and the other guy and that inmates would come and go so you'd have different roommates bunk cellies they call them um so your i was on the top the other guy was on the bottom a little space. Sometimes they lock you in and you'll be in there for a couple of days. You do pushups in there. So it was real prison like in the movies. And then after 32 months, because I was well-behaved model inmate, then I was able to get transferred to the camp. And the camp is still prison. You're away from your family, but there aren't any fences. You're on your own. You can't leave the boundary. And there's more free time. You're not just monitored like you are in that higher prison because they're always keeping an eye on everybody. And you're with a different type of, the community's different. It's a less threatening or violent type community in the camp. But that first 32 months was where I started. And I didn't fear anybody.

You know, I grew up in a rough and tough neighborhood. And you know, after they did what they did to me. It's rough and tough, and then there's prison. Yeah. But yes. But after what they did to me and all the different feelings I had, I feared nothing. And if somebody wanted to hurt me, in different feelings I had, I feared nothing. And if somebody wanted to hurt me, in some ways, it was almost a relief.

You know, you can, if you know what I'm saying, it'd be sort of like get you out of your misery. Because to me, of course, the hardest part was the yearning for home and missing your children and your wife. The hole in your heart that you're walking around with always. And it never goes away. Over time, it blunts. And as the years unfolded, I mean, it would be weeks and months and seasons and years and years and years. That hole in your heart and that pain that you feel deep inside that's always with you, it's a constant companion, it blunts. But then it would get triggered. You'd be around a bunch of guys, somebody might say something that's funny, you'd laugh, and then you'd remember something maybe about your children or your wife or home or

something. And then that sadness would come in and it would remind you where you are and where you've been for a long time. So it's not an easy thing. Of course not. But here again, I have- In a way, Rod, it's like, you're mentioning my dad and I wouldn't recommend the loss of someone that close to you at the tender age of 15 to anyone. But when you lose somebody to death, you know, they're gone. You know, you have to go forward and you think of those memories and you're sad that the person's no longer there to share them with you. But in a way, this seems almost harder because the people are still here and they're just going on without you. All these great new

memories are happening. You just can't have any access to them. You're just excluded and you'll never be able to go back and get access to them again. I mean, I'm not trying to bum you out. I'm just thinking about the torture that must be. Well, yes. But as you write in your book and you talk about embracing adversity, I know you say that because I saw you say it on TV and I know what your book's about. That's what you have to do. And so my mission, my purpose was to lead by example and teach my daughters hard lessons now by living it. So as I said, you can catch up on your reading. I read a great book three times in those 2,896 days called Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. And in that book, he says that the last human

freedom is our freedom to choose our own attitude in any given set of circumstances. And my purpose after I left the real world and crossed into that threshold, which was now prison, in that tiny little world that I was now in, with all those gangbangers, some of the murderers and criminals and all the other guys, the bank robbers and the rest. My purpose was to be as strong as I possibly can be, to use that time in the most constructive way that I can use it to get through the time and to plant the seeds for one day. Maybe you can do something good later on in life, but most of all, to teach my daughters by the example that I said during this difficult, hard circumstance, how you face adversity. That's how I convinced myself that I had purpose. I think that was the

right thing to do. And it gave me inspiration to go on and be strong because let's face it, it's a long, long time. And you feel like the whole world's come down on you. Sometimes hope creeps in, despair creeps in. I mean, hopelessness creeps in, despair creeps in. I mean, hopelessness creeps in, despair creeps in, and you got to push it away. And when I would remind myself of what my purpose was, which is something better than me, my daughters, and the love I have for them and Patty, I had to endure and persevere and eventually overcome. And so it actually gave me strength in a weird way. So let me ask you an impertinent question, which is, you know, I'd be less worried about despair creeping in in my little cell than I would about another man. I mean, that's got to be a concern, right?

So tell me about that. You mean some guy kicking your ass or some other? No, I mean, did anybody ever come for you in a less than threatening and sort of a, hey, gov, love gov kind of way? Yes, you're asking a valid question because that's very real there, as you know. Well, you don't know that,

but it is. I mean, it is a fact of life that some of these guys get together and do that thing stuff. There are gay people there and they, they gravitate to other gay guys, but there are guys who are not gay who then do that. I never felt threatened by any of that, frankly, and never did. I mean, there's, you're going to have conflict when you're with men for a long time, every day, all those years,

you know, I want the window open. He wants it closed. There'll be conflict. You are with men who are mostly criminals. I mean, there were some others that maybe didn't do what they were in there for, maybe, but most of them are criminals. There were a lot of tough guys, as you can imagine, and you're going to have conflict from time to time. But like I said, I mean, after what I had gone through and feeling the real pain, which is the loss of the heartbreak, being away from my family, I never felt any fear or anything that any of those guys can do to me that would cause me anything to worry about. I never did. I mean, obviously, getting beaten up in the courtyard, the one that like getting raped, that's not something like, seriously, how do you make sure that doesn't happen? How do you like, does anybody come on? If I like hell. Well, like how did you telegraph? Don't, don't mess with me.

Well, you know, you mean physically? Yeah. Like, aren't you worried you go in there? Like I saw the video, like you're a runner, but like, you're not the biggest, most burly guy I've ever seen in my life. I'd be a little worried. You got the great hair. I don't know. Thank you. Um, well, there's a guy in prison by the name of Sinclair. I hope he's doing well. I really liked this guy from North Carolina. He could bench press 750 pounds. You know, they had good workout facilities at that higher security prison. And I kept myself busy exercising a lot too. Now you're right. I'm not big like those guys, but you know, you develop friendships and then, you know, if somebody wants to screw with you,

some of those guys who like you are there for you if you need them. But I never really felt every time that I get close to some conflicts and physical conflict with somebody, again, it's inevitable, but I never really felt ever being endangered. You know, maybe I was just oblivious to it. I don't know. Maybe they were all Republicans. What's that? Maybe they were all Republicans. They just, you weren't their type.

No, there were more Democrats there. No, way more Democrats. There were? Oh, yes, of course. Demographically. Yeah. Not particularly surprising. So, all right. So what about that? Because you were were talking about the gangs and this is where you don't stand. Who teaches you that when you get to prison?

Yes. Well, a couple of things. For one thing, early on, I was called in by the captain and lieutenant. When they call you in, you're already locked into the housing. That's where the cells are and the dorm area that everybody's locked in behind the iron gates and the iron doors. And they have these hours where you got to be locked in. And this is like three o'clock, they lock you until dinner time, which is about 5.30. And then you can go out for a few hours in the warm weather. And then you get locked in again at eight o'clock at night until the next morning at six. But anyway, I was there for a day or two and I'd walked the track with a black guy from the South side of Chicago who had already been in prison for 17 years. He was a drug dealer. And of course he knew who I was

because I'd been the governor. And I was just brand new there and getting to know him. And of course he knew who I was because I'd been the governor. And, uh, you know, he, we, I was just brand new there and getting to know him. And I got called in the next day by the captain and Lieutenant. And they, when they call you, when they do it on a, on a, uh, not the microphone, what do you call loudspeaker, right? Inmate Blagojevich report to the captain's office, the Lieutenant's office. And when that happens, you learn, generally, the inmate that's being called in did something really wrong and is likely probably not going to see that inmate again, because they're probably going to be sent to solitary confinement or they're going to be transferred to another prison. Because as you can imagine, there's a lot of violence from time to time. Some of these guys will fight. Some of the fights get really nasty. There's all kinds

of activity that's illegal. So that's not an uncommon thing. So when I got called in right away, the scuttlebutt in the community was, the gov must have really done something wrong. And I think they expected to not see me again. But I was called in because these guys, the cops, that's the correctional officers, they wanted to give me the lay of the land and teach me the rules, which was you can't walk the track with a member of the other race. You got to stay with the white guys. Yeah. And they told me that they put me in touch with a couple of guys that I should go see. And they explained to me what the rationale was, but why they separate

the community along the lines of race. And they, the Latino guys stay with the Latino guys, the Native Americans, the Native Americans, black guys with the black guys, white guys with the white guys. It's like a college campus in America in today's day and age. Yeah. In the segregated South back in the 1950s, right? No, and sadly yet again in 2022. I mean, this is where we're going now, where we're, you know, all these race affinity groups where only the blacks and only the whites and only the whatever.

No, your point's well taken. I'm sorry to be turned home to this neo-racism that's gone crazy since the world has changed since I came home. And it's like, holy cow, that's how it's supposed to be in prison. That's what we've gone to after we elected, you know, Obama president.

It should have gone the other way. Right. You must have been shocked. Yeah, keep going. Well, so they're explaining the customs. You got to, you got to stay with your own and they call them cars. You got to travel with your own car. And it's the gang, the group that you should be in, because if someone wants to hurt you, your group will protect you. And it comes down to race. And it's sort of like mutually assured destruction that if there's

enough guys in each group, no one screws with anybody, Fs with anybody, that's the word that's used, because then the whole group has to fight. And that's sort of the customary way of living there. And so they were telling me, you can't be breaking these rules by walking with black guys. And I remember saying vividly, look at me, and after what I've been through through and all these set things, I live my whole life a certain way. I'm not changing this for that in this place. And I know you want to protect me, but I'm not afraid of anything. And they said, well, we're asking you to not try to make a civil rights statement in here because this isn't the real world. You're in a different world. And we want you to help us keep order because we don't want to create an environment where sort of the standard rules that people follow and have for a long, long time are being chipped

away at. And so I was sensitive to that. I never stopped hanging around with people of other color or race. You didn't say to yourself, I have an opportunity here that is fucking gold. For $50,000. Just kidding, Guff. Some final thoughts with Blago after this. Let me ask you this. I think probably the reading you enjoyed a lot. I understand you formed a jailhouse band as well. You're a big Elvis fan. Jailhouse rocks. I love it. What was the best

part of prison? Weird question, but What was the best part of prison? Weird question, but what was the best part if there was one? Well, the best part was the day I left, by far. Yeah, that day was fantastic. That was effing golden. What did the other prisoners do when you left? Well, there were some false starts. So for example, President Trump had called Patty in July of 2019 to tell her that he was going to send me home in a few days. And this was before that Ukrainian phone call. God bless President Trump, because what happened then was now suddenly, days after he called Patty to say he was sending me home, the Democrats created a fake issue on the phone call to President Zelensky, of all people,

regarding Hunter Biden, Burisma, and all that stuff in Ukraine, a perfectly legitimate phone call by President Trump. And so they were going to make this a big political issue. So that slowed down. So when that happened, I knew that politically he was in no place to be able to send me home because the Republican congressman from Illinois wrote him a letter urging him not to send me home. And then Governor Pritzker, who was on those FBI tapes asking me to make him a senator, he called him a couple of times. So I was held up. In other words, I couldn't leave at that time like I thought I was going to leave, but it looked like I was going to leave in August. And so they, prison guards, the correctional officers came to my room at five in the morning and they said, let's go. He's sending you home.

You're getting clemency. Get your stuff, get your stuff. They rush you out of there. And so there were a bunch of guys and the officers were surrounding me. This is very unusual in prison that something like this happens. And so they separated the guys that were working the early morning shift. And there's a lot of the guys that are up that early in two different lines to make way for me. And they were being told by the officers. There were several of them there to handle this because I had to take all my books and stuff with me to tell all these guys, nobody talks to them. Nobody says anything as I'm leaving. And so as I walk out and I think I'm leaving then in August, they were there amazed at the whole thing. And so as I walk out and I think I'm leaving then in August,

they were there amazed at the whole thing. And a lot of these guys were my friends. I'd been with them for so long. I turned back to them and I said this, Megan, of course, I don't mean this, but I said to them, can I swear here? Yes, yes, you can swear. Can I? I'm going to say this as I said it. Is that okay? Yeah, yeah. So I just turned to all of them. I said it. Is that okay? Yeah. Yeah. So I just turned all of them. I said, Hey, when I'm president pardons for all you motherfuckers. And, uh, so I thought I was going home that day and it turned out six, eight hours later, after I was in a cell for hours doing pushups and working on my re-entry remarks, I was sent back up to the camp and the commutation was pulled back and I had to wait.

Oh my gosh. I wasn't sure that it would happen. What? sent back up to the camp and the commutation was pulled back and I had to wait. Oh my gosh. I wasn't sure that it would happen. What? Oh my gosh. I mean, just like the false taste of freedom. But then it did come. I mean, one day you did get out. You went back home.

There was Patty, your girls. And here's where I want to get to how things are going now. Because when I watched that documentary, I was worried about the state of your marriage. Patty very clearly does not want you to run for office. He was, if there was an opportunity for him to run, would you think about it? Or is it just like, you're just like, I'm done. You're not doing it or I'm not, I don't want to be part of it. Yeah. That's a hard no for me. Yeah. Look, we're all free to live our lives. And if he wants to follow some political path, it's like he's doing that without me. Unfortunately, I can't do it again. But you, like I say, you're like a moth to the flame

when it comes to, you know, the cameras and this this weird game of politics. And I saw a man who is not going to be able to stop himself. And I saw a woman resolved to leave that man if he throws his hat back into the political arena. And a woman who's kind of already irritated because you missed the past eight years. And, you know, I'm sure her I'm sure her reserves for drama from Rod are pretty filled. So what's what? Like what you got? Like, what are you going to do? Because I think you really are at a point where you're going to have to choose. If they clear the way for you to run again, you're going to have to choose between your marriage and your career.

Yes. And by the way, I can't run for state or local office. They passed a law only against me, which I insist is unconstitutional. And he said that I am free to run for federal office. I could run. You definitely sound like somebody who's not considering it. I could run for the United States Senate. I could run for Congress again, which I wouldn't do. I could run for president United States, which is ridiculous, which I wouldn't do it. I'm for president Trump, but no, I could run for the United States Senate. And believe it or not, some people have actually suggested that having said that, if you're asking me, you know, what decision would I make? It's a no brainer. Are you kidding?

I'm choosing my wife and her happiness and my children over a political career. I would never do it if she wasn't on board. And you know, I want to serve. I want to do things that are meaningful. I'm making a documentary film on crime in Chicago. That's where my focus is. We're going to pre-production in two weeks. It's going to be called Black and Blue, dealing with the mistrust between the Black community, the police, and vice versa. That's timely. And all these complicated reasons why we have so much violence in Chicago, these crazy Democrats on defund the police, abolish the police, and that kind of stuff.

It's going to be an in-depth look. I think I'm the perfect guy to be able to do something like this because I've been on both sides of that issue. So that's where my focus is. I would never do to Patty something like that after what she's been through. You know, after I was elected, I was arrested, Megan. You know, you learn these things along the way, but they bet on everything in Las Vegas. And the Vegas odds makers within a couple of days of my arrest were taking odds.

And it was nine to one, nine to one that she wasn't going to stay. And what she did. And I know as a matter of statistical fact, that if an inmate's in prison, a man is in prison for four years or more, there's a better than 90% chance statistically that she doesn't stick around, especially when the guy has a lot more time to do. And had President Trump not intervened, I'd still be there till May of 2024. So Patty has defied all the odds. She's a wonderful wife. I hope you know better than that. She's a wonderful mother. And she raised our daughter. She's a successful businesswoman. But when I watch you and when I listen to you today, I think you're worried about your legacy,

like you said, my obituary. And you can't think about that. You can't fix that, right? Like, yes, it'll say convicted felon. Okay. I mean, you know, so will Martha Stewart's. But like, what if you go on and lead the rest you now, not the one who's speaking on camera and like, you know, public person. But like, wouldn't that be a better road than, oh, returns from fallen, becomes, you know, U.S. Senator. Oh, you know, the now single Rod Blagojevich. And Patty's off and she marries some young, hot dude. And you're like, mother. And then you're going to find it's not as fulfilling as you thought it was going to be back at the quote top, which really isn't the top because politics is a

cesspool. Don't do it. You know, you let's you got to show us that you learned something in prison. And that is what you know what what to prioritize, right? I love what you're saying. You can appreciate this. There's an old Irish prayer that says even God can't make two mountains without a valley in between. So I am climbing out of that mountain. I mean, out of that valley I was in, I'm trying to climb back up the mountain. But I think you're right. It should be a better mountain, a different mountain and a better mountain. Look, if I somehow became a United States Senator, that changes my obituary. That would be the greatest political comeback ever. Whoever comes out of prison like that and does

something like that. So from an ego standpoint, that's a very persuasive argument. I am suspicious of you. No, no, no. And I have this, believe it or not. I have all these books you see, and I even read those before prison. So I have this belief, this historical sense and all of that. That means something to me. But no, everything you just said is absolutely right.

When you balance what Patty's been through, a loving and devoted wife and mother, daughter-in-law, how good she was to my late mother, a wonderful sister and a wonderful daughter. She's just a wonderful person. The unhappiness that she's had to go through and suffer through what my daughters have had to go through. And I've been given this unbelievable new beginning by President Trump through the hand of God, which I believe. It isn't for me to be selfish and just do what I want to do like it used to be in that career that I was in. And then you're right, that I become a US Senator. Let's say, hypothetically, that happens when I'm around a bunch of other US Senators. I know US Senators. They're pansies. They're politicians. They're fakes. They don't do a lot. They talk a lot.

So I'd be in that world and then she wouldn't be with me. It would be almost biblical for me to screw up like that, wouldn't it? And it would be the wrong thing to do. And forget about my happiness. It's their happiness. It's their happiness. Pardon me? If you start to waver, you call me up and I will redirect you. Now that we bonded in this way, I feel like I can say that to you. So let's talk for one second, because you mentioned the crime in Chicago and we covered a lot on this show. And I wonder if somebody, as you say, who's kind of been on both sides. I mean, it's a disaster. And Kim Fox, who's totally light on crime, this another George Soros based D.A. who

doesn't want to prosecute crime. And you've been a D.A. So, you know, you understand, you know, you need to do it. You shouldn't run for that office if you don't actually want to prosecute crime and you've been a DA, so you know, you understand, you know, you need to do it. You shouldn't run for that office if you don't actually want to prosecute crime in a city that's got record murder rate. Chicago's changed dramatically. As I said, I used to live there, you know, back in whatever, late 90s, early 2000s. It's a shadow of its former self. The great John Cass writes about it all the time on his website. What do you think? You go to prison, you come out all these years later, you look around at your great home state in Chicago and think to yourself, what? Wow, has the world changed? Boy, the Democratic Party, the party of JFK, President Kennedy, this is not President Kennedy's Democratic Party. He wouldn't be a Democrat today

in this Democratic Party. The Democratic Party I was in was the party that was on the side of the working guy, the little guy, the men and women who go to work every single day. We felt they're, you know, we were concerned about their issues, concerned about the burdens that they face, tried to make their lives a little the biggest concern, the biggest responsibility of government starts with public safety. That's why we have government. We used to be a party that supported the police, enthusiastically embraced the police, chased the police to take photographs with us, to be in our political pamphlets and on our television commercials. And so I've come back to a political party that's just the opposite. Now, there've always been bad cops. You disagree with me. I'm telling you, I spent all that time in prison because of dirty, rotten, bad cops, those corrupt prosecutors, Fitzgerald and those other people. But in spite of that, I know that for every bad cop, there's a thousand good ones. And where would we be without the police? And I would sit in prison

on that bunk of mine from time to time, and fear would creep in. Who's protecting my children? My wife and my little girls are in our home all by themselves. We've had two shootings in front of my house over the last six weeks. There've been two shootings. The most recent was only three weeks ago. And so the neighborhood we live in is a nice neighborhood, but just to the other side of a couple of streets is a gangbanger neighborhood. Always been like that. So who's protecting my family? 17th district police officers. And I know what they do, what they mean to the communities, that they are sworn to protect their duty. And most of them do a great job doing it. And they risk their lives every day when they

leave home. They kiss their wife goodbye, or she kisses her husband goodbye, and they go to work. And you never know whether they'll come home from work. They have an unusual occupational hazard that they face. And for Democratic politicians, they'll come home from work. They have an unusual occupational hazard that they face. And for Democratic politicians, they'll abandon them because they're afraid of these crazy left-wing activists that defund the police movement, the abolitionists who are Marxists, who've creeped into the Democratic Party. And that's where the energy is in today's Democratic Party. They're selling out the constituency that has made up the Democratic Party. And the principal constituency, the one that suffers the most is the black community, because 75% of the murders in Chicago are black people. And when you take police out of the black neighborhoods, the gangbangers run rampant. And I knew, I know, because I lived with prison criminals for eight

years. When the cops aren't around, it's, you know, the cat's away, the mice play. And criminals are criminals. This is what they do for a living. It's their way of life. A lot of them aren't bad guys, the guys I was with, but this is what they do for a living. This is their livelihood. And when the police are weak, when they're on the run, they're not being defended by the political leaders, but they're being sold out by the Democratic political leaders like our Mayor Lightfoot, our Governor Pritzker, and others around America. The gangbangers aren't stupid.

They know. And so they run rampant. So we have record numbers of murders in Chicago, carjackings, snatch and grab robberies. We had a gangbanger, 11 years old, just carjacked a vehicle two weeks ago here in Chicago, 11 years old, a sixjacked a vehicle two weeks ago here in Chicago, 11 years old, a six. And Chicago is the city where they've basically said, ignore it. If it's gang on gang murder, ignore it. Even if there's an eyewitness, it's like, you know, whatever. Okay. So that's, you know, you're going to get a lot more of that. And people get caught, innocent people get caught in the crossfire, like four-year-old little girls at McDonald's and so on.

So what happens then? Now, I'm not saying you're going to run for office, but you may get out there and support somebody. You may get out there and use your voice. And you're right. You have a unique credibility on this issue. You've been both a DA and an inmate. I mean, that's very extraordinary. So what do you, I know you're a Trumpocrat, and I think there are a lot of Trumpocrats, you know, Democrats who crossed over to vote for President Trump. Let's assume he doesn't run next time. I assume you're a Trumpocrat, and I think there are a lot of Trumpocrats, Democrats who crossed over to vote for President Trump. Let's assume he doesn't run next time. I assume you would support him, the guy who commuted your sentence. But if he doesn't run, you see yourself voting for a different Republican or for Joe Biden? Well, not for Joe Biden. No, not for Joe Biden. Probably a different Republican, but in my heart's set on President Trump, I think he's

going to run. I think he's going to win. I really do. And I can go into all kinds of details on why I think that'll happen. But I feel like back on the crime issue, as you said, I think I can do a lot more good on my documentary on crime in Chicago. That could serve the public far better than me ever being, let's say, hypothetically, a United States senator and giving a speech in the Senate where no one's listening. And no one's even in the chamber when they give these speeches, right? You got a little of the Trump TV magic in you too.

And you could put that to use in a different way. Thank you for saying that. Yeah, so I'm really excited about my documentary. And I feel that's my way back to do service that way. You can also, if you're successful, earn a good living, hopefully. I would like to be able to be successful in doing something like this that's meaningful on a topic that I know so much about. And I have street cred. You see, I have real street cred, twofold.

Number one, in the African-American community, the Black community, my last election, I got 96% of the Black vote. In the Democratic primary for Governor 2006, 95% of the Black vote against another Democrat. I mean, only Obama gets that. So I've had great success in the black community politically. Then I've had this happen to me. And in the black community, because they have very real reasons to be mistrustful of the police. I think there's a lot of belief that what I can talk about on these issues, I understand some of the difficulties that they face. And so therefore, I think I can serve a lot of good that way. And then the other part about street cred is one advantage when you go to prison, like I've been at the higher one in particular,

because they don't like snitches there, Megan, there's a saying in prison, stitches for snitches and snitches are bitches, right? And they will screw guys up. They'll laugh them up if they're snitching on them. That's part of the code of practice among the inmates. But one of the advantages, there's no advantage. I should take that back. But a positive of having a 14-year sentence when you have to live in that community is they know you didn't tell on anybody.

You didn't snitch on anybody because if you did, you'd have had a real light sentence. And so that gives you street cred in that world. And therefore you can communicate and you can develop relationships like I did there all that time. And I feel like that kind of street cred will help me in my documentary. And I would love to make a great documentary that can actually help reduce crime and make our community safer. What's it going to be called? Do you have a name yet? Yeah. Black and Blue. Black and Blue. Oh, you mentioned it. Okay. And when does it come out or is that unclear? So no, the goal is to get it out right after Labor Day, pre-production in about two weeks, editing in June, July. And got real good producers involved.

Joel Cheatwood is a guy who used to be at NBC here in Chicago. Yeah, I. Joel Cheatwood is a guy who used to be at NBC here in Chicago. Yeah, I love Joel Cheatwood. We worked with him at Fox. He's brilliant. Yeah, and there's a guy by the name of Joel Weasel who's a documentary filmmaker

who's doing a documentary right now in the Peter Schweitzer book on China and the Bidens and the Bushes and the politicians who sell out our country to China. Listen, if there's anything America loves, it is a comeback. And I think I speak for a lot of people when I say I look forward to watching you climb that second mountain, hopefully away from a Senate race or anything that would cost

you so dearly at home. Rod Blagojevich, thank you so much for coming on and having such an open, feisty, fun discussion. Thank you, Megan. And thanks again for the inspiration for my daughters. Appreciate you. You bet. All the best to you guys. Thanks.

Wow. And thanks to all of you for joining us today and all week. And remember, you can download the show, Megan Kelly Show, on Apple, Pandora, Spotify, and Stitcher. Please go ahead and subscribe while you're there. And subscribe for our video version as well at youtube.com slash Megyn Kelly. Thanks for listening to The Megyn Kelly Show. No BS, no agenda, and no fear.