Chicagoans accept a fair amount of self-serving behavior from their politicians - not least from the scions of the city’s powerful political clans.
But the latest revelations about Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr.’s campaign organization funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars to his wife, Chicago Alderman Sandi Jackson, may pack more of a political punch because they come at such a delicate time for the veteran congressman.
Jackson is already the subject of a House ethics probe related to his contacts with former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich last fall when he was seeking Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate seat. Blagojevich has been charged with trying to sell the seat to the highest bidder, among other crimes.
Jesse Jackson Jr.
As Bloomberg News first reported last week, the payments to Sandi Jackson totalled $247,000 for consulting, and another $298,927 in cash and in-kind contributions for her own campaign fund.
While deemed legal by election law experts, the transfers do raise ethical questions, especially since Sandi Jackson campaigned for alderman promising to give “my full attention to the post.” She has represented the city’s seventh ward since 2007.
In the two years since she assumed the job, she was paid at least $95,000 for consulting work by her husband’s campaign.
Jesse Jackson Jr., 44, the eldest son of the civil rights leader, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, denies any wrongdoing, saying he received a Federal Election Commission advisory opinion in 2001, saying the consulting payments to his wife were legal.
In its decision, the FEC noted Sandi Jackson’s “considerable experience and expertise,” since she had worked on Capital Hill and in Democratic campaigns before she married Jackson in 1991.
But government watchdogs were critical, pointing out that Jackson’s campaign organization kept the records in such a way as to disguise who was being paid.
For instance, some reports list the recipient as J. Donatella & Associates – Sandi Jackson’s sole proprietor consulting company, apparently named for the couple’s oldest child, Jessica Donatella Jackson.
Other reports, from 2003 through mid-2005, list the recipient as “Lee Stevens” or “Lee Steven” at J. Donatella. Sandi Jackson’s full name is Sandi Lee Stevens Jackson.
“Much of this may be legal, but let’s refer back to an old quote: the scandal in Washington often is what’s legal,” Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics, a government watchdog group in Washington told Bloomberg.
“Mr. Jackson is availing himself of the full range of loopholes by which he can transfer money to his family.”
A Jackson spokesman said a software glitch caused the abbreviated version of her name to appear on some records.
“Congressman Jackson and Alderman Jackson are each other’s biggest supporters” and “do their best to follow all federal, state and local rules, laws and ethic codes,” said the spokesman, Rick Bryant.
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