Rod Blagojevich
speaker
701 appearances
4 recordings
4 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard 26 Mar
Rod Blagojevich’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 2 in all, peaking in Mar 2026 with 1.
Appearances
of the long-term members of Congress, the people in the different agencies, the staffers. And it's a whole different world there. And it's basically them against us. There is a deep state. In state government, federal government, it's really almost... Even in law enforcement.
What's it called?
Yeah. Yeah. You see that here again, the stuff we're talking about, it's so important that this justice system gets reformed. So excited about the fact that Trump, the people he's picking, Pam Bondi, he's a great person. He's got a good record. Patel.
Because if we don't trust the criminal justice system, when you tell me a story about those dirty cops, and I'm sure that's absolutely what they were and that those who prosecuted them were right to do it.
But what if you don't trust those prosecutors? Right. Suddenly the whole system breaks down. You can't trust anything. So much at stake in this. I failed to tell you what that first night was like. And I just should wrap it up very quickly. But, you know, there I was in this darkness and so all alone and so heartbroken, so fearful and worried about my kids and my wife and what it was like for them.
Imagining in my mind. My wife comforting my daughters as if I had died because I kind of did. I was gone. They were going to grow up without their father. So all of that's going through my mind. And then I reached for the Bible that my wife gave me to leave for prison, to take with me to prison. They don't let you bring anything else in, but they'll let you bring the Bible in.
I've always had a belief in God. I always believed in prayer. I was raised in the Serbian Orthodox Christian church. But I never read the Bible. I was just so busy trying to get ahead in life. You know, I had to go out and make campaign promises, give speeches, kiss babies, shake hands, raise money. I tried Genesis. I get stuck in Genesis. So-and-so's beginning so-and-so.
I'll put this on the side. I can't. Now suddenly here I am in this deep fucking dark valley and I'm facing 14 years of this. I'm so alone. I'm not going to fuck around with Genesis or Deuteronomy or Leviticus or any of that stuff. I'm going to something right away that might give me some hope. And I went to the 23rd Psalm. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
It makes me lie down in green pastures. And then I kept reading the Psalms. And I know the story of David. And I associate myself with him. I know I'll get criticized and maligned by people in the media for saying I'm like David. I'm not saying I'm not. I'm not saying I am.
I'm simply saying I looked at his example and I got strength from that because he was being chased by Saul and he's in the caves for like 11 years or chasing him. I'm thinking he endured that. Maybe there's hope. And I'd read his Psalms because they're just prayers to God is what they are from him. And they were helpful to me.
So I kept reading and I went to Isaiah and the fiery furnace of affliction and how... Adversity in hard times is God's way of testing us. It can make us stronger and better. We learned through those hard lessons the fiery, you know, through the fire of hard times. And, of course, then eventually the Gospels. And the best story of all, in my mind, as a Christian, is the story of Jesus.
And there he is in the Garden of Gethsemane, and he's saying to God, because he's so afraid, because he knows what's coming, what they're going to do to him. And he says, oh, Father, please lift this cup from me. I mean, I get choked up just thinking about this. And he says, but no, God, no, Father, not my will, your will.
And then he steals himself for what he's got to face, takes on all the suffering that he goes through and the humiliation, everything else. So I read it every day for 2,896 days. And I know it in a way I never knew it before. And I love it. And it brought me so much closer to God.
And there were moments, as crazy as this sounds, and I'm not running for anything, so I'm not here to try to win Christian evangelical votes or anything. But there were moments years into the process, not those first early years because they were so hard. But after I was there for year six, year seven, and I'd read the Bible like that every day,
And I was really working out and I was reading a lot of other books. And I'd get visits maybe a couple of times. In the beginning, it was like two or three times a year in the beginning. And then as time went by, it was hard for our daughters. And I would encourage them not to come because they were in school. And we were hopeful that we'd get justice in the courts.
And only another few more months, the appellate court will come through. Don't come. So now suddenly I'm seeing less and less of them. But I'd have moments, and I was lucky because I was in Colorado, which is a beautiful place with great weather and blue skies and snow-capped foothills of the Rockies. That's where the prison was. And then when it would rain, there'd be rainbows.
I believe these are godly things, and I'd sometimes get done with a run or something, and I'd walk that track, stretch it a little bit, and I'd see that beautiful rainbow, and I could almost feel the presence of God. I know it sounds like bullshit for people who don't know that, But when you've been beaten down so much and you're so fucking alone, I looked for God and I really believe I found him.
And I feel like I'm at a place now where I'm grateful in a weird way for that experience. I wish it never happened. And I have bitterness still. And I hate the motherfuckers that did it to me. And I know I'm not supposed to hate them. I'm supposed to forgive them. I'm not that good a Christian. I hate the motherfuckers. They belong in jail.
But I have to say that that experience, reading the Bible that way, maybe it serves a higher purpose. Maybe in some ways, you know, it was good for me.
Bible talks about false prophets because people are human nature.
Showing 441–460 of 701 · page 23 of 36
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