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The wife of Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) received some unwanted attention yesterday from The Hill newspaper, which pointed out that he has gone to bat for a bank outside his district that his wife previously worked for.

Luckily, spousal employment is a matter of public record, and LegiStorm maintains the financial disclosures of all members of Congress and their staff. In our own review of Rep. Gutierrez's disclosures, we were interested to see that his wife Soraida has since switched jobs and now works for another financial house, Ramirez and Co. Indeed, she's a registered lobbyist for them with the State of Illinois.

Potentially even more interesting is how Ramirez describes the access they are afforded by having Soraida on their payroll. In Soraida's bio, the company describes her as an "active participant in her husband's career in public service."

One day before Illinois Governor Rob Blagojevich was arrested on corruption charges, the Chicago Tribune ran a story on another Illinois politician whose real estate dealings have created at least an impression of shady dealings.

The Tribune's Monday report details real estate deals that have netted Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) more than $400,000 - many of them done with contributors to his campaign. The article cites Gutierrez as saying the real estate deals present no conflict of interest because he is not involved in local zoning matters, but the Tribune reports Gutierrez has asked Chicago politicians to support regulation changes that would benefit his supporters.

Gutierezz disclosed the real estate deals on his personal financial disclosures, which are available at LegiStorm.