The Danny Solis angle
Thursday, Mar 3, 2022 - Posted by Rich Miller
* Sun-Times…
The [Madigan] indictment was built, in part, on the work of former longtime Chicago City Council member Danny Solis (25th) whose cooperation with federal prosecutors was first exposed by the Chicago Sun-Times in January 2019, and who helped the feds build a similar indictment against Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th), the longest-serving member of the council.
The Sun-Times also exclusively reported in January 2019 on an affidavit detailing the investigation that led to Solis’ cooperation. That document revealed that the feds secretly recorded Madigan in his law office at Madigan & Getzendanner in August 2014. Court records filed in connection with Madigan’s indictment Wednesday confirm the investigation goes back to the same year.
In March 2019, the Sun-Times also reported on a potential deal involving Solis and a Chinatown parking lot that is now part of Madigan’s indictment.
* Mark Brown…
We know from previous reporting that McClain’s phones were tapped and that former 25th Ward Ald. Danny Solis also was caught on wiretaps with Madigan even before he turned FBI mole. The indictment makes clear that after Solis began cooperating he turned his sights on Madigan as well as since-indicted 14th Ward Ald. Edward Burke. […]
There are also new schemes involving Solis’ efforts to set up Madigan, offering to help him get private legal business by squeezing businesses that needed the alderman’s help at the City Council to hire Madigan’s firm, which specializes in helping reduce real estate taxes. Solis told Madigan he wanted a state appointment in return, and the speaker allegedly agreed to help.
My favorite part of the indictment involved Solis telling Madigan he’d made it clear to the representatives of one company that this would require a “quid pro quo.” At first Madigan allegedly responded: “Okay . . . very good.”
But later Madigan allegedly advised Solis not to use the phrase “quid pro quo” the next time he spoke to the business people he was shaking down on the speaker’s behalf, instead offering a more elegant pretext.
“You’re just recommending . . . because if they don’t get a good result on their real estate taxes, the whole project will be in trouble . . . Which is not good for your ward. So you want high quality representation.”
* Illinois Public Radio…
To help boost business for his firm, Madigan allegedly agreed to help then-Chicago Ald. Danny Solis (25) get appointed to a state board — a job that ideally would pay more than $100,000 annually — in exchange for Solis steering clients to Madigan & Getzendanner.
As part of that agreement, Solis — then the chair of the city council’s zoning committee — floated a complicated plan to transfer a parcel of state-owned land in Chicago’s Chinatown neighborhood to the city, which the city would then turn around and sell to developers looking to build a hotel. Solis would strongly advise those developers to retain Madigan’s firm.
Both the plan to appoint Solis to a state board and the scheme pass legislation to sell the land in Chinatown hit major snags, never coming to fruition. But what Madigan didn’t know was that Solis was cooperating with the feds and had secretly recorded multiple conversations with the speaker while talking about plans to drive business to Madigan’s law firm.
In one such conversation in 2017, Solis updated Madigan about the progress of an apartment project, telling the speaker that the developer seemed to be open to retaining Madigan & Getzendanner for help.
* Block Club Chicago…
In one case in June 2017, Madigan asked then-Ald. Danny Solis — who was chair of the city’s zoning committee — to introduce him to the representative of a company that needed to get a zoning change through City Council, according to the indictment. Madigan wanted to “seek business” for his law firm, according to the indictment.
Solis told Madigan representatives of the company would meet with the then-speaker so Madigan could try to get business for his law firm — and the company still needed to “deal with” the alderman for its zoning change, according to the indictment. […]
Also in 2017, a group that wanted to develop a hotel in Chinatown needed to get the state to transfer its ownership of a plot of land to the city so the group could then get it and develop it, according to the indictment. Madigan agreed to use his position to support the passage of legislation that would transfer the land to the city; in exchange, work would be steered toward his law firm, according to the indictment.
“In the past, I have been able to steer some work to Mike [Madigan], and these guys will do the same thing,” Solis told McClain in that case, according to the indictment. McClain then agreed that would Madigan would help get the land transferred to the city, according to prosecutors.
Solis also told Madigan that, if Madigan helped transfer the land, the developers would “appreciate it” and would give Madigan’s firm tax work, according to the indictment. “OK, all right, very good,” Madigan said, according to prosecutors.
* Tribune…
Then-Ald. Daniel Solis, who was secretly cooperating with the investigation, recorded numerous conversations with Madigan as part of the Chinatown land probe, including one where the speaker told Solis he was looking for a colleague to sponsor a House bill approving the land sale.
“I have to find out about who would be the proponent in the House,” Madigan allegedly told Solis in the March 2018 conversation. “We gotta find the appropriate person for that. I have to think it through.”
Like the state appointment Solis wanted, that bill went nowhere.
* From the indictment…
It was further part of the scheme that, on or about November 2, 2018, MADIGAN told McCLAIN that “we never settled on a sponsor” for the bill concerning the transfer of the Chinatown parcel, and MADIGAN told McCLAIN that Representative B would be a suitable sponsor for the bill in the House of Representatives because Representative B’s seat was within the Senate district that included the Chinatown parcel. […]
It was further part of the scheme that, on or about November 21, 2018, McCLAIN advised Alderman A that a “major hurdle” to passage of legislation concerning the Chinatown parcel had arisen, in that the Illinois Secretary of State had received petitions from local businesspeople in Chinatown who were opposed to the transfer of the Chinatown parcel, and that the Illinois Secretary of State had reached out to leadership in the Senate to express opposition to the transfer.
It was further part of the scheme that, on or about November 23, 2018, after Alderman A advised MADIGAN that there was opposition to legislation providing for the transfer of the Chinatown parcel and that it was best to wait until after upcoming elections and attempt to pass the legislation in May 2019, MADIGAN agreed to do so.
…Adding… Good point…
