Boston Mayor Michelle Wu might want to look over her shoulder at the latest election results in her hometown of Chicago, where the liberal mayor was thrown out by fed-up and frightened voters.
Incumbent Mayor Lori Lightfoot finished an embarrassing third in Tuesday’s preliminary election with just 17% of the vote, a rude repudiation of her liberal policies and failure to stem a crime wave in the streets of the Windy City.
The results mean Lightfoot will be ousted as mayor after just one term. The leading vote-getter, Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas, who got 34% of the vote, will now face off on April 4 against second-place finisher Brandon Johnson.
Lightfoot made history four years ago as the first Black woman and openly gay person ever to serve as Chicago mayor.
But voters didn’t care about history on Tuesday, showing the door to Lightfoot and delivering twice as much support to the law and order candidate Vallas, who vowed to clean up crime in the city. Johnson, an African American Cook County Commissioner, also surprised pundits by finishing second, getting a large share of the African American vote which deserted Lightfoot.
“Public safety is the fundamental right of every American,” Vallas said. “We will have a safe Chicago. We will make Chicago the safest city in America.”
That promise seems questionable given the severity of the murder and violent crime rate in Chicago. But voters clearly were open to the message, and gave Lightfoot failing marks by a wide margin.
“I stand here with my head held high and my heart full of thanks,” Lightfoot told supporters in her concession speech.
Wu has paid far more attention to diversity and inclusion than crime during her tenure, despite a wave of well-publicized attacks and murders in the city.
While Boston’s homicide rate is far lower than Chicago’s, she has also ignored calls from some Black community leaders to put more police on the street in crime-ridden neighborhoods and in the schools.
During Wu’s tenure, there has been the murder of a 13-year-old boy on the streets of Mattapan, the attack on civil rights activist Jean McGuire in Franklin Park, an altercation between groups of people on mopeds and dirt bikes and a motorist on Gallivan Boulevard, a series of shootings on July 4th weekend, the shooting murder of a 15-year-old boy in Dorchester, attacks of people on MBTA stations, and numerous other alarming acts of violence across the city.
Wu’s reaction has been to throw money at social and diversity programs, like announcing this week nearly $1 million in grants to help “returning citizens” – which is woke code for ex-convicts.
Wu seems to be relatively safe now, and incumbent mayors in Boston almost never lose. But incumbency also comes with problems. She’s not up for reelection for two years – which is a lifetime in political terms – plenty of time for opponents to start lining up against her if things go bad.
If she continues to ignore the plague of violence and other quality-of-life issues, she does so at her own political peril.
Just ask Lori Lightfoot, another rising liberal star and soon-to-be ex-mayor of Chicago.
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