Defense attorneys for Rod Blagojevich have renewed their request for the official reports on the FBI's interviews with president-elect Obama following Blagojevich's 2008 arrest.
Specifically, the lawyers want to know if Obama ever reported any of the governor's alleged shakedown attempts.
"It is essential for the defense to know whether President Obama, subsequent to the alleged 'ask,' reported it to anyone, and that he believed this 'ask' to be illegal or improper," wrote attorney Lauren Kaesberg, in a motion filed this morning in federal court.
Noting that the president-elect was the incoming head of the Justice department, "President Obama presumably had a duty to report it, if he believed it to be criminal."
The request is similar to the one filed -- and denied -- before the start of the first trial and the one filed before the former governor's second corruption trial began.
The defense claimed in its April motion that the Obama interview notes could "go directly to the heart of testimony of several government witnesses." The motion also claimed the notes "would almost certainly have been disclosed if the interviewee was anyone other than the president."
