Marathon Pundit: Ali Ata: Rezko and Republican insider plotted to oust prosecutor Fitzgerald

The Ali Ata guilty plea--scroll down for more--is already having a major impact on the investigation of corruption within Illinois state government.

From the Chicago Tribune's Swamp blog:

Karl Rove, the president's former political "architect,'' did not have designs for the removal of Chicago-based U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, Rove's lawyer said today.

Prosecutors in the trial of Antoin "Tony' Rezko in Chicago suggest differently - telling the judge this morning that they want to call to the stand Ali Ata, a former member of the Blagojevich administration who pled guilty to corruption. Assistant U.S. Att'y Carrie Hamilton said she believes that Ata will testify to conversations with Rezko about trying to stop the criminal investigation of him in 2004.

"He (Ata) had conversations with Mr. Rezko about the fact that Mr. (Bob) Kjellander was working with Karl Rove to have Mr. Fitzgerald removed," Hamilton told U.S. District Judge Amy St. Eve today. Kjellander, Republican superlobbyist, is a longtime Republican National Committeeman from Illinois who was an occasional business associate of Stuart Levine, who has pled guilty to conspiring with Rezko to rig state boards for contracts.

Ata would testify about trying to have Fitzgerald replaced by someone else, Hamilton said, "so individuals who have been cooperating in this investigation will be dealt with differently."