In early November 2008, Rahm Emanuel relayed Barack Obama’s wishes for his former Senate seat to Rod Blagojevich through lobbyist John Wyma, according to Wyma’s testimony today.
Wyma testified that he called Blagojevich, Blagojevich’s secretary and his Chief of Staff, John Harris, attempting to convey the message that Obama wanted his advisor Valerie Jarrett to succeed him in the Senate. Wyma said was unable to reach Blagojevich directly, but that Harris said he would relay the message. In a later phone call, Wyma suggested to Harris that it would be good to get back to Emanuel in the next day or so.
Not long afterwards, Wyma said he was called by former Blagojevich aide Doug Scofield.
“Scofield said he was calling on behalf on governor,” Wyma told the court. “It was unusual, in that nobody called me on the behalf of the governor before. We tended to speak directly.”
Scofield, Wyma testified, said Blagojevich was interested in floating to Emanuel the idea of helping to set Blagojevich up with a job at a non-profit.
“The call didn’t make a lot of sense to me,” Wyma said Tuesday, “It was very awkward.”
Wyma added: “I thought that with the Senate decision in the balance, it would look like the two were connected.”
Scofield suggested that he could state in his conversation that the two were unrelated, but Wyma thought otherwise. He never ended up calling Emanuel.
“I thought it was very transparent,” he said on Tuesday afternoon. “There’s no way you could have that kind of conversation without having it linked to the Senate seat, and I was unwilling to do it.”