Do the expanding pension scandals have a Chicago connection?
The pay-to-play probes currently scrutinizing controllers of public pursestrings from New York to New Mexico to Alabama have so many parallels to the sweeping Illinois investigation that turned Gov. Rod Blagojevich into a reality show candidate, we’re kind of surprised they haven’t overlapped more.
For one, they both revolve around questionable public pension fund investments and “swaps” contracts. In Illinois, the probe began with questions about millions of dollars in consulting and “finder’s” fees collected by Republican lobbyist Bob Kjellander for directing a $500 million teacher pension fund investment to a Carlyle Group hedge fund and convincing another state pension fund to bet on an interest rate swap that generated big fees for Bear Stearns. Some of those fees, according to last month’s indictment of Blagojevich, wound up in Blago’s own bank account.
But back in 2004, when CDR Financial Products, one of the main consulting firms being under investigation in the scheme, tried to set up shop in Chicago, it got nowhere.
The firm, which is under investigation for conspiring with investment banks to sell states, cities and other public works programs pricey interest rate swaps, did all the right things: its lobbyist Bob Stratton, who was also a senior political advisor to New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, hired Blago’s top fundraiser Milan Petrovic to help them get meetings with top Illinois debt and budget officials in 2004 and 2005. But CDR got scant business in the state, which never used it as an advisor or consultant on any major deal.
Chicago-area firms are involved in other state’s pay-to-play scandals. Loop Capital Markets, a boutique investment bank that used to employ Michelle Obama’s brother Craig Robinson, was involved and recorded by the FBI — though never accused of wrongdoing — in a Philadelphia pay-to-play scheme that landed the city treasurer in federal prison. Vanderbilt Capital Group, another Chicago firm, sold the New Mexico teachers’ pension funds and State Investment Council a controversial $90 million CDR with the $2 million placement agent services of a Richardson ally named Marc Correra. And Correra earned several million of at least $13.5 million in finder’s fees he collected securing New Mexico pension fund investments operating under the auspices of a Chicago firm called Cabrera Capital Markets. Cabrera counted Illinois as a client, though it did not appear to be a major one in the Blago era.
Where there’s so much smoke — and so many federal agents on the case — one might expect fire, but perhaps the Blago crew — which, after all, holds the distinction of allegedly sharing the spoils of its scheme with a Republican lobbyist — was too insular to involve itself in the larger national scheme. We expect we’ll find out soon enough.
