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Senate's Democratic majority clears path for Roland Burris

Pressure by President-elect Barack Obama leads to about-face

By Rick Pearson and Mike Dorning | Tribune reporters

11:13 PM CST, January 7, 2009

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sen. Richard Durbin speak to the media after a meeting with Illinois U.S. Senate appointee Roland Burris on Capitol Hill in Washington. (Tribune photo by Nancy Stone / January 7, 2009)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate's Democratic majority opened the way Wednesday for Roland Burris to become Illinois' next senator, pressured by President-elect Barack Obama to remove a politically consuming distraction less than two weeks before he assumes the White House during an economic crisis.

A top Senate Democratic source said Obama's concerns about the Burris situation were among several factors that resulted in an about-face by Senate leaders, who had vowed to reject Burris or anyone else named by disgraced Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Obama told Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and others when he visited Capitol Hill this week "that if Burris had legal standing—and it appears he has—he should be seated as quickly as possible," a senior Democratic official said Wednesday. Obama earlier had sided with Reid's opposition to the appointment.

Reid held a 45-minute Capitol Hill meeting Wednesday with his top deputy in leadership, Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, and Burris. Afterward, Reid called the Blagojevich appointee someone who was "candid and forthright" and "not trying to avoid any responsibility or trying to hide anything" about how the governor named him to the seat.

"I'm happy," Burris, 71, said after the meeting. "My whole interest in this experience has been to be prepared, Roland, to represent my great state. And that is my love. That is my desire. And very shortly, I will have the opportunity to do that as a junior senator from the fifth-largest state in this great country of ours. Isn't it great?"

Reid and Durbin outlined a path for Burris to take office that puts much of the pressure back on state lawmakers and Supreme Court justices in Illinois. They said Burris needs a ruling by the Illinois Supreme Court forcing Secretary of State Jesse White to certify Blagojevich's appointment. They also said they awaited Burris' answers to questions Thursday about the appointment when he appears before an Illinois House panel that is considering impeaching Blagojevich.

White said he resented Reid pressuring him, comparing it to "strapping me in a wheelchair and pushing [me] down four flights of stairs." The secretary of state said he did not believe his signature was necessary for Burris to be seated.

Reid said that if the two Illinois issues are resolved—with the paperwork signed and Burris addressing Illinois lawmakers' questions—the appointment may be referred to the Senate Rules Committee. "There's going to come a time when the entire Senate is going to have to act on this, and that day I hope would come sooner rather than later," Reid said.

Durbin said he expected that seating Burris could be resolved in a matter of weeks.

He was among 50 members of the Senate Democratic caucus who said they would refuse to seat any Blagojevich appointee following the governor's Dec. 9 arrest on political corruption charges, including allegations of trying to sell the now-disputed Senate seat that Obama vacated.

"He's been elected four times statewide, who says: 'I've done nothing wrong. I shouldn't be condemned for the sins of Blagojevich,' " Durbin said of Burris on WGN-AM (720). "But also, at the same time, make sure at the end of the day we know what happened and that it meets with the approval of the American people and the people of Illinois."

On Thursday, Burris is expected to face more intense questioning from Republicans than from Democrats at the Illinois House impeachment hearing.

Many panel members said privately that they don't expect the appearance to expose any nefarious tie between Burris and Blagojevich, but State Rep. Jim Durkin of Western Springs, the lead Republican on the panel, said there was plenty to discuss.

"Mr. Burris, I believe, owes this state and owes the committee an explanation of a lot of things," Durkin said.

Other GOP panel members said they planned to question Burris about the role played by one of Blagojevich's criminal defense attorneys, Sam Adam Jr., in acting as an emissary of the governor in offering the Senate appointment.

Some Republicans said privately that they were already looking past Burris' taking office and ahead to 2010, when the Senate seat is up before voters. They said they believed the politically ambitious Burris would seek election to the post and be a likely favorite to win a Democratic primary. That, Republicans reasoned, could give them an opening in running against Burris, an appointee of a politician who could become the first Illinois governor removed from office under impeachment.

Appearing after the meeting with Burris, Reid and Durbin offered reporters no explanation for the apparent change in heart in looking to seat the former attorney general, who became Illinois' first statewide elected African-American when he won the comptroller's office in 1978.

On Dec. 30, when Burris was appointed, Reid, Durbin and the rest of the Senate Democratic leadership declared that, in light of the accusations that the governor tried to peddle the Senate seat, "anyone appointed by Gov. Blagojevich cannot be an effective representative of the people of Illinois."

But little more than a week later, Durbin said Senate Democrats had vowed only to "carefully scrutinize and review the process by which the Senate seat would be filled if Gov. Blagojevich was involved."

One Senate Democratic source, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the issue, said the Senate leadership had been urged by the incoming Obama administration to "end the distraction" involving Burris in light of the economic crisis the president-elect is inheriting.

Other reasons for looking to seat Burris included the uncertainty of winning a long legal fight and a splintering within the Democratic caucus, primarily among those up for election in 2010 who were feeling pressure for denying a seat to a person who would be the chamber's lone African-American, the source said.

But Rep. Bobby Rush, the South Side congressman who has injected racially charged language into the appointment, said on MSNBC that the sight of Burris holding a news conference in the rain after being refused admittance to the Senate floor Tuesday was akin to "the dogs being sicced on children in Birmingham, Ala."

Rick Pearson reported from Springfield, with Mike Dorning in Washington. Tribune reporters Monique Garcia, Ray Long and Ashley Rueff contributed to this report.

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