Testifying in a federal corruption trial must have been demanding for former state Sen. Terry Link earlier this month. Especially since he forcefully denied for months he had become a stoolie and secret agent for the feds.
Not so demanding is that the disgraced former 30th District senator and head of the Lake County Democratic Party gets to keep his lucrative state pension, despite admitting he evaded paying federal income taxes.
The Indian Creek Democrat, who resigned his state post in 2020, was the chief witness earlier this month in the U.S. court trial in Chicago of politically connected businessman James Weiss. He was charged with agreeing to pay bribes to advance sweepstakes gaming legislation that would help his company.
Link became involved as the main sponsor of the gaming bill which expanded casino gambling in Illinois. Following a weeklong trial, Weiss, 44, was convicted by a federal jury of attempting to pay off two state legislators and then lying about it to the FBI. He could be sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.
Link, however, appears to have dodged a prison sentence for filing false income tax returns from 2012 to 2016, evading paying some $82,000 in taxes after he converted campaign funds to personal use. The 76-year-old former lawmaker pleaded guilty to those charges in 2020.
That was after he decided to be an undercover operative when the U.S. attorney’s office came knocking and accused him of the tax charges in 2019. Link has yet to be sentenced for his crime which indicates he may again have a starring role testifying in open court at other upcoming federal trials.
One of the legislators convicted in the gaming bribe scandal, Chicago Democrat representative Luis Arroyo, who was surreptitiously recorded at a Highland Park fast-food restaurant offering Link a $2,500-a-month “consulting fee” on behalf of Weiss, lost his state pension after being convicted and sentenced to nearly five years in prison.
State law requires that lawmakers be stripped of their pension benefits by the General Assembly Retirement System board if they are convicted of crimes committed during their legislative service. But Link has gotten a pass and allowed to keep his more than $7,750-a-month legislative retirement, which includes an annual 3% boost.
In a legal opinion from 2021, fellow Democrat, Attorney General Kwame Raoul, ruled Link’s crime of tax evasion did not relate to his time in the Illinois Senate. Raoul’s order conveniently overlooked the fact Link received those campaign funds he used for his personal lifestyle expressly because he was a state senator and elected public servant.
If say Link worked at AbbVie Inc., in his hometown of North Chicago, or any other business, those corporations, businesses and individuals from across Illinois would not have been depositing thousands of dollars in his Friends of Terry Link campaign fund. That fund, as of April, had more than $365,000 stashed in it, according to the committee’s quarterly report filed with the state Board of Elections.
Illinois election law is fairly loose on what you can spend donated campaign funds on. Something you can’t spend the money on is gambling.
That’s one of the uses Link testified to while on the witness stand during the Weiss trial. Questioned by federal prosecutors, Link admitted to withdrawing money from his Friends of Terry Link campaign fund, using “some for gambling.”
That’s ironic since Link for years led the push for more gambling casinos in the state, including The Temporary in Waukegan, which opened earlier this year at Fountain Square. He also told the federal jury he used some of the campaign funds to help, “a friend who was in dire need.”
Once, Link had a sterling legislative record, sponsoring major legislation, including the state law banning smoking in public places across Illinois. Like many elected Illinois officials, he became caught up profiting by serving in the legislature on behalf of those in his Senate district.
His cooperative testimony, he hopes, will give him a break when it comes to being sentenced on the tax evasion charges. Perhaps he should.
But he shouldn’t get a break on keeping his pension, which is paid for by Illinois taxpayers. The vast majority of them file their taxes on time and correctly.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor.
Twitter: @sellenews
