Chicago rejects disastrous Lori Lightfoot

But what comes next might be even worse

Yesterday, Lori Lightfoot became the first Chicago mayor in 40 years, and only the third since Prohibition, to fail in a reelection bid. Lightfoot finished third in the Democratic primary, winning only 17 percent of the vote.

The Chicago Tribune called Lightfoot’s miserable showing “a political embarrassment.” Lightfoot called it racism and sexism.

Asked by a reporter if she had been treated unfairly, Lightfoot responded: “Of course. I’m a black woman in America.” Similarly, in an interview with the New Yorker, she complained, “I am a black woman — let’s not forget. Certain folks, frankly, don’t support us in leadership roles.”

But just four years ago, most folks supported Lightfoot for the top leadership role in Chicago. In fact, three-fourths of the voters backed her in the runoff election.

What happened in the past four years to change this? The Lightfoot administration happened.

I want to be fair. There’s no doubt that, as the Chicago Sun Times says, Lightfoot “was dealt a bad hand: the pandemic, civil unrest triggered by the murder of George Floyd and the violent crime wave after those demonstrations.”

But, the paper adds, “bad timing is too simple to explain Lightfoot’s stunning political downfall.”

Bad timing does not explain why violent crime is up 40% since Lightfoot promised during her inaugural address to stop the “epidemic of gun violence that devastates families, shatters communities, holds children hostage to fear in their own homes” and leaves parents wondering “if Chicago is a place where they can continue to live and raise their children.”

It does not explain why Lightfoot has been such a disappointment to the lakefront voters who formed the base of her support in 2019. Lightfoot opposed the elected school board after saying she’d support it; failed to deliver the transparency she had promised; and broke her pledge to raise the real estate transfer tax on high-end home sales to create a dedicated funding source to reduce homelessness.

Bad timing also can’t explain Lightfoot’s inability to get along with people and a relationship with the City Council so contentious at least seven members of her own leadership team abandoned ship, endorsing other mayoral candidates.

It’s also worth noting that Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker was dealt a hand similar to Lightfoot’s, yet managed to win a second term, albeit after spending $132 million of his personal fortune.

Chicago’s former inspector general Joe Ferguson, once an ally of Lightfoot, said that “at the front end, she did not govern the way she ran and at the back end, she ran the way she governed.” Bad formula.

Alderman Anthony Beale was even more critical:

She had a great opportunity. Everybody was excited, including myself. We all had high hopes for her. But she came out of the gate and got power-drunk. Instead of governing as though people voted against the other person, she thought there was a mandate for her to do whatever she wanted to do. She became this totally vindictive person against everybody. . . .

It turns out she was the least transparent, least productive, least cooperative administration I have ever seen in my life.

Clearly, Lightfoot’s defeat wasn’t due to racism/sexism. It was due to terrible results — especially an ungodly spike in crime — and a horrid approach to governing.

What comes next? The runoff will pit Paul Vallas against Brandon Johnson. Vallas was the CEO of Chicago’s public schools in the late 1990s. Johnson is a Chicago Teachers Union organizer and Cook Country Commissioner.

Vallas is a liberal. Johnson is a far-leftist. Vallas is white. Johnson is black.

Vallas is running as a law and order candidate. He won the endorsement of the local lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police.

In his election night speech, Vallas pushed his law-and-order message while surrounded by friends, a family that included four police officers, and a backdrop that interspersed his name with the words “public safety first.” He said:

I will support our law enforcement officers, but I will also support, and have a zero tolerance, when it comes to violating the law and violates the constitution. We will have a safe Chicago. We will make Chicago the safest big city in America.”

Johnson, by contrast, has unabashedly supported diverting police funds to “people programs,” though he downplayed this during the campaign. According to this report, Johnson was the only candidate in the primary who did not promise to put more cops on the street.

Johnson’s plan for dealing with crime is largely woke — including support for “restorative justice” and use of “violence interveners” He also wants to ditch the city’s gang database because it’s “racist.”

Johnson was backed by the powerful, leftist Chicago Teachers Union, for whom he has been an organizer. Without its support, he would not be in the runoff. If elected, it’s reasonable to assume that Johnson will be looking out for the Union, not for students trapped in massively failing Chicago schools. There’s virtually no chance that a Brandon Johnson administration would break the Union’s stranglehold on public education.

Nearly all of Johnson’s funding came from leftist unions. SEIU locals were his other main source of money. He is thoroughly beholden the left and he appears to be an out-and-out leftist, in any case.

Vallas led the way in yesterday’s election with 34 percent of the vote. Johnson was far behind with 20 percent. However, most of the remaining vote went to candidates to the left of Vallas and all of the other candidates are non-white. Thus, it’s far from clear that Vallas will prevail in the runoff.

There’s no reason to believe Vallas can reverse Chicago’s downward path. But there’s ample reason to fear that Johnson would send the city plummeting rapidly to something like rock bottom.

If the voters of Chicago elect Johnson in a race where the contrast between the candidates is this sharp, rock bottom will be what they deserve.