Chicago mayoral runoff could reveal direction of Democratic voters
(CNN) — Chicago voters will weigh in Tuesday on the direction of the Democratic Party, choosing between progressive Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson and moderate former city schools chief Paul Vallas in the mayoral runoff.
In a contest dominated by contrasting visions over crime and policing, the outcome could offer a window into how voters’ views have evolved in one of the nation’s largest cities in the four years since they elected a reformer, outgoing Mayor Lori Lightfoot, whom they are now replacing after she failed to advance to the runoff.
It’s not clear whether results will be known Tuesday night. Chicago counts mail-in ballots postmarked by Election Day, and the number of ballots left to arrive and be counted could be larger than the winning margin on election night, if the race is as close as many strategists and political observers in the city expect.
Vallas and Johnson are competing to replace Lightfoot, whose bid for a second term ended after she finished third in the nine-candidate February 28 first round.
Lightfoot had sparred with two of the most powerful forces in this year’s mayor’s race: the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, which endorsed Vallas, and the Chicago Teachers Union, which backed Johnson, a former teacher and union organizer.
The clash between those two unions is part of a larger battle over how the city handled the Covid-19 pandemic — a period during which violent crime increased and schools were shut down.
Vallas campaigned on a pro-police, tough-on-crime message. He vowed to fill hundreds of vacancies in the Chicago Police Department and said he would emphasize community policing and place officers on public transit, after a recent violent crime spike at the Chicago Transit Authority’s trains and stations alarmed many commuters.
He also highlighted Johnson’s history of supporting calls to “defund the police” — a message that became popular with progressives in 2020 in the wake of the police killing of George Floyd but that has since receded amid violent crime increases in Chicago and other cities. Top Democrats, including President Joe Biden, have long rejected the slogan.
Johnson now says he does not want to slash police spending. He has said he would promote 200 new detectives, arguing that solving more crimes would increase Chicago residents’ trust in police and deter crime.
Vallas, who is making his second bid for Chicago mayor, entered the runoff with a commanding advantage, having won 33% of the vote in the February election — well ahead of Johnson’s second-place finish at 22%.
But his base of support, more conservative and more White than other contenders, carried risks for the runoff. Chicago is a diverse, overwhelmingly blue city, with 83% of its electorate backing the Democratic ticket in the 2020 presidential election.
Vallas and Johnson spent the weeks leading up to the runoff courting the approximately 45% of the electorate that did not vote for either candidate in February. They were particularly focused on Black and Latino voters outside of Johnson’s progressive base and Vallas’ support in White ethnic neighborhoods and the northwestern portion of the city.
Latinos, who make up nearly 30% of Chicago’s population, according to the US Census Bureau, could prove to be a critical swing group in the runoff. Democratic Rep. Jesús “Chuy” García, who finished fourth in the February election, was the top vote-getter in several heavily Latino wards and has since thrown his support to Johnson.
Vallas featured Black mainstays of Chicago politics, including former Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White and former US Rep. Bobby Rush, in his closing television advertisement touting his Democratic credentials.
Johnson has argued that Vallas is too conservative for the city, highlighting donations Vallas’ campaign received from business interests and Republicans, as well as digital ads paid for by a PAC with ties to former Trump Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.
“When you take dollars from Trump supporters and try to pass yourself as a part of the progressive movement — man, sit down,” Johnson said at a rally in Chicago with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders last week.