North Cook News

Cook County Board Commissioner Sean Morrison hopes healing can come to Springfield now that the Mike Madigan era has mercifully come to a close.

“We’ve had to endure so much under his control,” Morrison told the North Cook News. “No one should have control of a party like that, especially someone as controlling as Mike Madigan.”

After almost four decades of Madigan running the House, the veteran lawmaker resigned from his District 22 House seat and chair of the Illinois Democratic Party.

Those moves came after the Chicago Democrat being shown the door as House speaker weeks earlier, setting the stage for him to be replaced by Rep. Emanuel “Chris” Welch (D-Hillside).

All the sweeping changes came in the wake of Madigan now finding himself under growing scrutiny after being implicated in an ongoing federal corruption probe allegedly involving utility giant ComEd and a pay-for-play scheme.

While Madigan has not been charged and maintains his innocence, ComEd agreed to pay a $200 million fine, and at least four individuals with known ties to him have been indicted as the probe continues to unwind.

Even with Madigan having walked away, Morrison said he may still not be out of danger.

“His name has come up in several potential indictments involving ComEd,” he said. “Time will reveal where he stands with that.”

Morrison said he’s not surprised to see Madigan electing to walk away now.

“It looks like he was in a battle with the governor for power, and the governor won out,” he said. “You can tell that by all the democratic state representatives that were influenced enough not to vote for him again as House Speaker.”

Still, Morrison said he isn’t sure what all the changes will mean when it comes to what direction Springfield takes.

“I don’t believe we’re going to see much different in terms of how democrats do business,” he said. “To be honest, the biggest difference I expect to see is a couple players stepping up to try to fill the void left by Madigan, and it leading to more infighting.”