‘POLITICAL PRISONER’

CNN’s Anderson Cooper Calls Out Rod Blagojevich’s Claims He Was a ‘Political Prisoner’

The CNN anchor laid into Rod Blagojevich, just released from prison after a Trump pardon, who compared himself to Nelson Mandela.

CNN anchor Anderson Cooper let his frustration boil over at the end of a contentious interview with Rod Blagojevich, whose 14-year prison sentence was commuted by President Donald Trump earlier this week. After a 12-minute interview during which Blagojevich referred to himself as a “political prisoner” on the same level as Nelson Mandela, Cooper let loose. “You got out. You do have an obligation to at least admit what you did wrong,” Cooper demanded. “And you refused to do that, and you’re creating a whole new alternate universe of facts.” After Blagojevich tried to defend himself, Cooper lashed out again. “And that may be big in politics today,” he said. “But it’s still, frankly, just bullshit.” Blagojevich was convicted of corruption charges for trying to sell Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat in 2008 as well as financial charges related to a children’s hospital. Cooper said it was “pathetic” that Blagojevich supported criminal justice reform now rather than when he was Illinois governor and presided over a broken system with a backlog of clemency cases. “I wish I would’ve done more,” Blagojevich responded.