Feds considering charges against AT&T subsidiary
Phone giant consulting contract being examined in offshoot of Madigan probe
Federal prosecutors investigating alleged schemes to influence former House Speaker Michael Madigan are considering filing charges against a subsidiary of AT&T involving a 2017 consulting contract, the phone giant revealed in a federal regulatory filing this week.
The Tribune reported in July 2020 that AT&T had been subpoenaed by federal prosecutors amid a widening criminal probe into Madigan’s political operation. The subpoena from U.S. Attorney John Lausch’s office was part of an inquiry into whether companies improperly used a stable of consultants with ties to the longtime House speaker as they pushed for legislation in Springfield.
This week, AT&T revealed in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that Lausch’s office had informed the company “they are considering filing a charge” against Illinois Bell Telephone Company LLC, an AT&T subsidiary.
The potential charge involved “a single, ninemonth consulting contract in 2017” worth $22,500, the filing stated. The filing said Illinois Bell has been cooperating since 2019 in the “widely reported investigation of certain elected Illinois politicians and related parties for corruption.”
“Based on our own extensive investigation of the facts and our engagement with the U.S. attorney’s office, we have concluded that the contract at issue was legal in all respects and that any charge against Illinois Bell or its personnel would be without merit,” the filing stated.
A spokesman for Lausch’s office declined to comment.
The revelation comes more than a year and a half after prosecutors subpoenaed Madigan’s office for “any and all documents and communications” concerning AT&T, including contracts and correspondence related to the hiring of anyone to provide consulting or lobbying services to the public utility.
In a statement to the Tribune in 2020, AT&T said only that, in general, it cooperates with any requests from law enforcement.
“Like all companies, from time to time we are required by law to provide information to government and law enforcement agencies,” the statement read. In an email Thursday an AT&T spokesman declined to elaborate on the company’s SEC statement or the investigation.
The company’s SEC filing was first reported by WBEZ.
Records show that AT&T has used several of the same former Madigan staffers and ex-Democratic state representatives as Commonwealth Edison, which has admitted in court documents to orchestrating a “yearslong bribery scheme” involving jobs, contracts and payments to Madigan allies in exchange for favorable action in the state Capitol.
In 2017, the year the AT&T contract in question was doled out, the phone company had in its army of lobbyists some of Madigan’s top former political staffers, including Tom Cullen, a longtime strategist with close ties to the Speaker.
In May of that year, another former Madigan political director, Eileen Mitchell, returned to AT&T after a brief stint as Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s chief of staff. She is currently the head of AT&T Illinois.
Meanwhile, like in the
ComEd case, AT&T had a big legislative goal in 2017: passing a controversial bill to end traditional landline telephone service to the remaining 1.2 million customers in Illinois.
Critics said the legislation would leave behind hundreds of thousands of Illinois residents, particularly seniors, who disproportionately rely on traditional landline telephone service for everything from connecting with family to monitoring life-threatening medical conditions.
After a protracted fight, the bill passed during the final hours of the spring legislative session. Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner vetoed the legislation, but the Democrat-led General Assembly overrode him.
AT&T and its employees have given heavily to Madigan’s campaign coffers, racking up more than a quarter of a million dollars in donations to three separate funds the speaker controls since 2016 alone, state election records show.
The probe of AT&T was an offshoot of a similar inquiry into ComEd.
A 50-page indictment filed in November 2020 alleged that beginning in 2011, Michael McClain, a former legislator and longtime friend of Madigan, and the others “arranged for various associates” of the Speaker — including his political allies and campaign workers — to “obtain jobs, contracts and monetary payments” from ComEd even in instances where they did little or no actual work.
Also charged in that case was former ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore, former ComEd lobbyist John Hooker, and Jay Doherty, a consultant for the utility and one-time head of the City Club of Chicago.