(Michael Izquierdo / WTTW News)

Commonwealth Edison in the 2010s welcomed dozens of college students into its summer internship program each year, offering paid work that offered the opportunity to turn into full-time jobs.

Applicants had to meet certain enrollment and GPA requirements in order to be considered for the coveted spots — all applicants, that is, except allegedly for a handful each year who came from Michael Madigan’s 13th Ward.

Jurors in Madigan’s ongoing racketeering and corruption trial on Thursday heard testimony from former ComEd exec turned government mole Fidel Marquez about how the company would set aside internship slots each summer as a gift to the former Illinois House speaker.

“It was done as a favor to Michael Madigan,” Marquez told jurors.

Madigan, 82, and his longtime confidant McClain, 77, are charged with racketeering, bribery and wire fraud. They have each pleaded not guilty. The former House speaker is alleged to have orchestrated multiple corruption schemes, wielding his significant political power to enrich himself and reward loyal allies.

The most substantial of those alleged schemes involved utility giant ComEd as prosecutors have claimed Madigan and McClain arranged subcontractor jobs for several of the speaker’s allies with the company even as they did little or no work.

In exchange, prosecutors allege, Madigan supported critical energy legislation in Springfield that benefitted ComEd.

But, as Marquez testified, ComEd also allegedly tried to bribe Madigan and remain in his good graces by offering annual internship slots to students from his ward.

Marquez, who worked as ComEd’s vice president of governmental affairs, said the company initially set aside six spots for applicants coming from the 13th Ward. McClain would forward resumes to Marquez, he testified, and he would work to find offices where they could work, regardless of their expertise or abilities.

“Attached is a request for a person to work in our legal department this year,” McClain wrote in an April 16, 2013 email to Marquez, “He will not learn very much and he will not be able to contribute much, if anything, but that is still the ask.”

That “ask,” McClain explained in the email, had come from “our friend” — a reference to Madigan. Other applicants were also suggested by 13th Ward Ald. Marty Quinn, according to Marquez.

“I have to say that generally Fidel tells me that the company is very happy with the quality and work ethic of the individuals you sponsor,” McClain wrote to Quinn in a Feb. 23 2016 email. “Kudos to the 13th Ward!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

According to Marquez, ComEd eventually expanded the number of spots it reserved for 13th Ward applicants from six up to 10.

In a February 2015 email shown to jurors Thursday, McClain asked Marquez “what is the ceiling” on the number of internship positions ComEd could offer to students from “our Friend’s ward.”

The following month Marquez told McClain in an email they could reserve 10 spots, saying it would be “easier to place 10 IT or engineering types much harder to place 10 less technical people.”

In April 2017, McClain ran into some issues getting 10 13th Ward interns seated, as the selections were being handled by Marquez’s assistant, who he testified was in the dark about the typical arrangement.

McClain then emailed then-ComEd CEO Anne Pramaggiore to complain that the assistant “has not been educated about our friend’s pathway.” Marquez testified that when he was flagged about the issue, he instructed his assistant to “allocate 10 positions for Michael Madigan.”

The following year, McClain complained again when a 13th Ward candidate failed to make the cut for the program due to her low GPA. After Marquez asked his assistant “what drove the change in GPA policy,” she informed him the candidate’s GPA was a 1.1.

“Holy mackerel,” McClain replied in an email. “Even mine were higher than that number.”

“I don't think our standards are that low,” Marquez later told him.

Jurors on Thursday also heard how Marquez and other ComEd executives regularly pushed to hire several other candidates for low-level jobs despite them repeatedly “bombing” interviews and appearing generally unqualified for work at the company.

But often they were still hired, Marquez testified, because they had been recommended for work by Madigan, through McClain.

McClain, Pramaggiore and two others were convicted of conspiring to bribe Madigan last year in the so-called “ComEd Four” trial.

Marquez eventually began cooperating with the government in early 2019 when federal investigators presented him with recordings of wiretapped phone calls detailing his own involvement in the alleged bribery plot.

Thursday marked his third day on the witness stand, where he also testified about ComEd’s contract with the Reyes Kurson law firm. Prosecutors have alleged Madigan and McClain convinced ComEd to retain that firm because one of its partners, Victor Reyes, was “particularly valuable to Madigan’s political operation.”

Marquez told jurors that while he normally would not be involved in negotiations over a legal contract, he was kept abreast of the Reyes Kurson negotiations and spoke with ComEd’s top lawyer Tom O’Neill about “the urgency of the request” because of its importance to the utility’s legislative agenda in Springfield.

​​“I did that,” he testified Thursday, “because this had been raised as an issue that could lead to a potential problem with Michael Madigan and needed to get ahead of that.”

O’Neill previously testified the Reyes Kurson contract was “atypical” because it included a specific amount of billable hours and that he was initially uncomfortable with that stipulation when the agreement was first signed back in 2011.

At that point, O’Neill testified that McClain told him this contract “was a matter that was important to the speaker of the House.”

When it came time to renew that contract in 2016, O’Neill sought to reduce the number of hours guaranteed to Reyes Kurson due to a lack of available work, but McClain emailed Pramaggiore to complain.

“I know the drill and so do you,” McClain wrote in the Jan. 20, 2016, email. “If you do not get involved and resolve this issue of 850 hours for his firm then (Reyes) will go to our Friend. Our Friend will call me and then I will call you. Is this a drill we must go through?”

While the landmark trial had previously been given an 11-week estimate, Judge John Blakey on Thursday said he doesn’t believe proceedings will be wrapped up in that timeframe. Instead, the case could extend into mid-January, depending on how long the prosecution takes to present its case and whether or not either Madigan or McClain put on a defense.

This is a developing story.