Blagojevich Addresses Reporters

Omar Castillo is a young man who was on the All Kids program. He was 17, 18 years old. And then it was discovered that he had a rare liver disease -- kidney disease. And as a result of that, his life was in peril unless he can have a surgery and get a kidney that his brother was going to provide for him -- his loving brother was going to provide for him. But he couldn't get the surgery that would save his life because his parents didn't have health insurance, and he was no longer 18, he was 19, and he wasn't eligible for the All Kids program.

We intervened and acted in a way, with legal advice, around the legislature. Omar Castillo got that surgery. He got his liver. He's now alive and well and he's going to live a long and full and happy life.

Is that an impeachable offense?

And so what we are here today to talk about, and what I'm here to talk about is the fact that I understand the House's action. I'm not at all surprised by it. But I took actions, with the advice of lawyers and experts, to find ways -- creative ways to use the executive authority of a governor to get real things done for people who rely on us. And in many cases, the things we did for people have literally saved lives.

I don't believe those are impeachable offenses.

BLAGOJEVICH: So we're going to move forward. And I'm going to continue to fight every step of the way.

Let me reassert to all of you, once more, that I am not guilty of any criminal wrongdoing. That issue will be dealt with on a separate course, in an appropriate forum, a federal court. And I'm confident that, at the end of the day, I will be properly exonerated.

In the meantime, I have a job to do for the people. They hired me to not just to say that I'm for things that could help them, but they hired me to fight for them. And I'm going to fight for them every step of the way, because if I didn't fight for them, the results that we've provided for people would not have happened.

And, by the way, there's a bill that passed the Senate that the House has yet to act on. And I would suggest that while they're busy trying to throw me out of office, they may actually want to stop families from being thrown out of their homes, because when every day passes after Christmas, 400 families are being thrown out of their homes because of the foreclosure crisis.

The State Senate passed a bill in November. The House is sitting on it and hasn't acted. I'd respectfully encourage them to feel free to pass that bill and keep those 400 families in their homes, who every day are being kicked out of their homes.

With that, let me close by doing something that I probably won't do much after this, but I feel like doing it again, since I did it not too long ago. I want to quote another British poet.

And I'm inspired by it, because it was something that Ted Kennedy talked about in 1980 at the Democratic convention in New York after Jimmy Carter won the nomination. And I remember seeing that, and I remember going to the library and getting that poem and memorizing it.

And it, kind of, reminds me a little bit about the situation that I'm in and all the men and women who've supported me and given me a chance to be their governor and given me a chance to be able to fight for families like the ones who are here today and fight for families like the one I came from -- an immigrant father who was a factory worker and a steel worker who worked 40, 50, 60, 70 hours a week, who sacrificed; a working mom who worked for the Chicago Transit Authority and passed out transfers at the subway stations. They never owned a home. They were all about sacrificing so their kids could have a better life.

BLAGOJEVICH: That's what most parents want for their kids.

There hasn't been a day that's gone by since I've been governor that I haven't thought about my parents, their struggles and their sacrifices, and have tried to fight a system that listens to special interests and lobbyists and puts the burden on all of the troubles in -- in our state on the backs of the hardworking people who are the ones who should be looking to government for help, not the other way around.

And so I'll leave you with this poem by Tennyson, which goes like this.

"Though we are not now the strength which in old days moved Earth and Heaven, that which we are, we are. One equal temper, of heroic hearts, made weak by time and by fate, but strong in will, to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

Thank you.

END