Former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is hoping to parlay his access to President Donald Trump into a moneymaking clemency ask for Frank Kollintzas, a former Indiana city councilman who allegedly fled to Greece after being convicted in a vote-buying scheme.
Trump in February 2025 issued a full and unconditional pardon to Blagojevich after commuting his 14-year sentence for political corruption charges. Now, according to a federal lobbying disclosure form first reported by NBC News, Blagojevich is reporting income of $50,000 tied to lobbying activities for Kollintzas. According to the form, Blagojevich is seeking presidential clemency on behalf of Kollintzas.
This isn’t the first time Blagojevich’s firm, RRB Strategies LLC, has filed disclosure forms seeking clemency. Last year, he tried to seek presidential clemency for former ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore. The form says she was “wrongly prosecuted, wrongly convicted, and wrongly incarcerated.” A federal appeals court ordered the release from prison of Pramaggiore and longtime lobbyist Michael McClain. It later formally wiped out the pair’s convictions, setting up the possibility of a new trial.
According to disclosures, Blagojevich reported three forms stemming from Pramaggiore’s case — totaling income of $280,000 tied to lobbying for her.
Clemency lobbying is now a multi-million dollar industry — as the traditional pardon process coming from the Justice Department has shifted closer to the White House. Those seeking pardons from Trump, including attorneys and lobbyists, are using their White House connections to try to make a case for their clients, and people are indeed paying them top dollars to do so. Others are trying to get to Trump directly — including at Mar-a-Lago.
A federal jury found Kollintzas guilty in 2004 of lying to a federal agent and converting funds of East Chicago, Indiana, where he served as councilman.
A judge later sentenced Kollintzas to more than 11 years in prison, writing that the charges related “to what can only be described [as] a frenzy of municipal improvements (new concrete and tree trimming) at city expense, but without legal authorization, in the weeks leading up to the 1999 primary election.”
Blagojevich spent eight years in federal prison before then-President Donald Trump commuted his sentence in February 2020. Though an appellate court tossed five of Blagojevich’s 18 convictions in 2015, federal prosecutors contend he remained convicted “of the same three charged shakedowns” for which he was first sentenced in 2011.
Those included his attempt to sell then-President-elect Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate seat, to shake down the CEO of Children’s Memorial Hospital for $25,000 in campaign contributions, and to hold up a bill to benefit the racetrack industry for $100,000 in campaign contributions.
Trump’s commutation did not undo Blagojevich’s convictions.
After signing the Blagojevich pardon in the Oval Office, along with a slew of other executive orders, Trump said, “It’s my honor to do it. I’ve watched him. He was set up by a lot of bad people, some of the same people that I had to deal with. He wasn’t quite as successful.”
Blagojevich, 69, met Trump when he was a contestant on Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice” show in 2010, before his court case was fully resolved. Though he ended up being “fired,” Trump took a liking to the outgoing former governor.
The new business foray for Blagojevich is raising some eyebrows. Former Illinois House Republican Leader Jim Durkin, who served on the Special Investigation Committee that led to Blagojevich’s impeachment in 2008, said clemency for Kollintzas would cheat victims of the case — twice.
“It’s one thing to erase the conviction, but it’s worse when you erase the restitution where the people who were defrauded in all these cases that we’re seeing receive nothing. They’ve been cheated twice by this individual. So I think that’s really wrong,” Durkin said.
Durkin acknowledged that Blagojevich is now part of the cottage industry trying to curry favor with the president — an association he called “unsavory.”
“Victims still have rights in this country. So I would just say that if this is how the former governor is hanging his shingle, I guess he’s got a couple years to do his magic,” Durkin said. “But I think it’ll run out by the time the next administration comes in.”
Blagojevich did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Contributing: Jon Seidel