Facing a tough reelection battle, Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot has decided to pivot on the police in an attempt to outflank her progressive challengers.
Speaking at a Chicago union hall on Saturday, Lightfoot criticized Brandon Johnson, a Cook County commissioner who’s gaining momentum, assailing him as a “radical” who’d “wreck our city with dangerous defunding of police.” This is despite Lightfoot’s proposal to cut the police’s budget in 2020.
“He wants to cut your police,” Lightfoot said of Johnson, in comments reported by Politico, arguing that he would take officers from “your streets making sure that you’re safe.”
Her comments follow a campaign ad from earlier this year that made the case that Lightfoot would “put more police on the streets.”
“Lightfoot won’t quit until we’re the safest big city in America,” the ad concluded.
Nine candidates are competing for the chance to lead the nation’s third-largest city. A new poll this week revealed Lightfoot is behind former Chicago schools chief executive Paul Vallas, who is the tough-on-crime favorite of the Fraternal Order of Police. She is also in danger of being bested by candidates to her left like Johnson and Representative Jesus “Chuy” Garcia (D., Ill.).
If no candidate wins more than 50 percent of ballots cast Tuesday, the top two advance to a runoff election on April 4. Despite her incumbency, Lightfoot is in danger of not even reaching the runoff.
Polls have shown crime and public safety to be the leading issue in this election. Last weekend in Chicago, at least 14 people were wounded and three were killed by gun violence. More than 70 people have been murdered in Chicago already in 2023.
In 2021, the number of murders hit a 25-year high of 797 under Lightfoot. The previous year, the Chicago mayor proposed an $80 million cut to her city’s police budget, according to InjusticeWatch.
The Chicago Police Department has seen a decline in the number of sworn officers, and a little-publicized report from Chicago’s Office of Inspector General last year found that suicides among officers continue. In 2017, the Justice Department found the suicide rate of Chicago police officers was 60 percent higher than the national average for members of law enforcement.