Feds Charge Former Top ComEd Executives, Lobbyists In Springfield Corruption Case
By Dan Mihalopoulos, Dave McKinney, Tony Arnold
Wednesday, Nov. 18, 6:04 p.m. CTUpdated 9:58 p.m. CT
Four months after Commonwealth Edison admitted to a long-running bribery scheme in Springfield, federal prosecutors on Wednesday issued criminal charges against four former ComEd executives and lobbyists.
The individuals charged in the new indictment in federal court in Chicago included the power company’s former chief executive, Anne Pramaggiore, and Michael McClain – a ComEd lobbyist from Quincy, Ill., who is a close confidante of Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, D-Chicago.
In July, ComEd admitted to an illicit, eight-year effort to win Madigan’s favor for electricity rate increases and other lucrative state legislation, funneling consulting payments to a litany of the powerful speaker’s allies for doing little or no work for the state-regulated, public utility giant.
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Beyond the potential political implications, the court records suggest, the corruption had a big impact on ComEd’s roughly 4 million customers in Chicago and across northern Illinois. The agreement pointedly noted that ComEd won two huge legislative wins in Springfield during the time of the bribery scheme, in 2011 and 2016.
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State regulatory records show those measures were worth billions of dollars to ComEd. A WBEZ analysis of those documents found the power company’s revenues from delivering electricity — and the profits it is able to make off customers in Illinois — rose sharply as a result of the legislation the utility got from Springfield politicians.
https://www.wbez.org/stories/feds-charge-former-top-comed-executives-lobbyists-in-springfield-corruption-case/e8e5d7cf-6418-4491-a152-fc7b1702907e
Those charged:
• Michael McClain, 73, who worked as a lobbyist for ComEd after a stint in the Illinois House of Representatives in the 1970s and early 1980s. McClain is a Madigan confidant;
• Anne Pramaggiore, 62, chief executive officer of ComEd from 2012 to 2018 and then a senior executive at ComEd subsidiary Exelon Corp.;
• John Hooker, 71, who served as vice president of external affairs for ComEd from 2009 to 2012 and then worked as an external lobbyist for ComEd;
• Jay Doherty, 67, owner of Jay D. Doherty & Associates, which performed consulting services for ComEd from 2011 until 2019.