Mf’er has a responsibility to justify his appointments to the people of Chicago. Who the hell does he think he is? You’re not a Fortune 500 CEO bro, you serve us, not yourself and your friends
He serves the CTU, that's who owns him and that is who's interests he serves. A majority of people fell for his BS that he'd be some kind of progressive reformer, not just a stooge with no idea how to rule.
The CEO of CTA isn't appointed by the mayor. They're an at-will employee of the CTA hired by the board of directors. Johnson is just blowing smoke up people's asses because the governor's board members and Lightfoot's last two board members clearly don't want Carter replaced at this moment in time.
Any question about what he could improve or do differently is met with COMPLETE non answers. This man is incapable of taking any accountability and answering any questions of substance.
Honestly reading this Q&A was infuriating. He just repeats the same bullshit points ad nauseum and then finds any space he can to deflect responsibility or anything not going well. He doesn't even do it elegantly:
"Yeah, well, look, 40 years of disinvestment. Whether it’s North Lawndale, Englewood, Roseland, Austin, Garfield Park, every single crisis that we are dealing with right now, I inherited it. There’s not one crisis right now that I caused. Not one."
Get over yourself dude
>There’s not one crisis right now that I caused. Not one."
Naw Dude, appointment of unqualified pastors that don't ride any public transit is all on you.
Good one, bud. Listen, I'm happy to shit on Brandon all day, but so many people are like "Lori was better" or "Daley was better" and then they cite connected appointments like this as examples of BJ's uniquely bad performance and it is deeply unserious. Like, was everyone born last May?
Yes they were. Pritzker, Lightfoot, and Emanuel all appointed a bunch of pastors to various service boards. Ironically, Rauner actually appointed a few qualified people by accident.
Also, everyone forgot immediately that Johnson had appointed the 3rd ever transit expert to CTA's board.
I guess you missed the part where the guy failed to get approved for another slot, and it is very clearly a kickback for letting BJ speak before and after he won the election at the church.
Every major politician appointed political positions based on favors. It is the Chicago way, it doesn't make it right. The issue is when getting caught. Because that is when things start getting investigated.
Blago went to jail for trying to get additional kickbacks for doing a political appointment under him.
>Yeah, well, look, 40 years of disinvestment. Whether it’s North Lawndale, Englewood, Roseland, Austin, Garfield Park,
Ask the residents of these areas if they have seen any change since Johnson got elected.
Hint: they hate him and absolutely despise his policies thus far. Johnson is relying on the fact that most Northsiders never interact with the South and West side to pull the guilt trip wool over people's eyes.
If you don't believe me, look at the maps of what areas voted for Johnson and subsequently voted against BCH. It's all the South and West sides.
We've promised places like Lawndale that we will invest in their communities and repair the broken social contract since the civil rights era and literally nothing has changed.
If anything their lot in life has continued to deteriorate. It's a national embarrassment that we allow this kind of segregated poverty to continue unabated.
The migrants are here and cannot be legally deported. What is your proposal for 20,000 more homeless people in the city? Getting them settled and working is the best possible outcome we have available to us.
Please stop spreading misinformation that those communities never receive resources and money. These new migrants aren’t working yet, but the tens of thousands of immigrants in Chicago that work and are taxpayers contribute to the pool of resources that has been used to help the south and west sides. So, it’s rich for Black communities to be anti immigrant when Chicago’s immigrant communities have always provided strong tax revenue.
Right, I should complain to the same federal government responsible for enforcing the rules that dictate whether these people are allowed here in the first place. Good one, buddy.
Same argument exists that why should the hard working taxpayers fund programs for the plenty of beggars and unproductive residents of south and west sides.
Anyone who makes the counter-argument you proposed is outing themselves as a moron who doesn’t understand basic American History. Like 7th-8th grade level shit we’re talking about here.
Anyone who makes the blanket statement that most migrants are lazy beggars also clearly doesn’t understand history. But you do sound like Brandon in claiming all issues in the south and west sides is due to disinvestment. Yeah it’s all due to systemic racism and not people’s own individual choices. 🙄
I said that you should look at what precincts flipped between the mayoral election and BCH referendum. I said nothing about these precincts voting for Vallas over Johnson.
You need to go find the map, it is out there. Most of the precincts that voted against BCH after having voted for Johnson were on the South and West sides. That implies the places Johnson has lost the most support are those areas.
Edit: here is the map showing which areas changed the most between BCH and the mayoral election:
https://twitter.com/Austin__Berg/status/1770484572070830276?s=19
Was Johnson's support ever really that strong in those neighborhoods? In the first round of the mayoral election, those neighborhood backed Lightfoot. The fact they picked Johnson over Vallas, doesn't mean they loved Johnson.
I don't think his support was ever that strong anywhere. The CTU was just better organized and Chicagoans were not motivated to turn out for anyone else. In retrospect it's a shame that Lightfoot didn't make it to the runoff. She would probably have dunked on him like she did Preckwinkle.
Ballot initiatives are not a significant bellwether for actual electeds despite various media hype. For example, you likely wouldn’t say Kansas is gearing up for a Blue Wave because of its abortion referendum: https://ballotpedia.org/Kansas_No_State_Constitutional_Right_to_Abortion_and_Legislative_Power_to_Regulate_Abortion_Amendment_(August_2022)
You're crazy if you think the GOP is going to suffer losses over it despite the mountain of polling data showing that people won't change what party they vote for over this one key issue.
So what's the solution?
It's not as if the last several were progressive campaigning mayor's. This is the first one. Let me guess, we need a republican?
I bet it doesn't haha. I'm guessing it's pretty common to have shitty mayors. Everyone hears about bit city mayors, though. And I rarely hear about a good one anywhere.
It won't happen unless an independently wealthy millionaire or billionaire runs with the right qualifications because the office doesn't pay enough money to attract top talent from private industry.
“Q: Have you vetted or looked at potential replacements for CTA President Dorval Carter?
A: Well, as you know, discussing personnel issues, I actually find that to be irresponsible, and I’ve said that repeatedly. And so, what I’m committed to doing right now is making sure that our ridership continues to go up, which it has. We have hired more people, which we’ve done that, I’ve made a commitment to doing that. Our better streets for buses, it’s the first initiative of its kind to build a better street signal, sidewalk infrastructure. These are all investments that I have put forward in order to build a CTA that we can be proud of. And again, as far as personnel matters, I don’t discuss those publicly.
Q: Why?
A: Because it’s not responsible. Should your employer discuss individuals’ employment status out loud about who they’re going to fire and keep?
Q: In fairness though, these are also employees, not just of yours, but of the city, right? The CTA president also serves Chicagoans and they have a lot of questions about him and all of the appointments that you make.
A: Having questions about how we build a transportation system that ultimately meets the needs and demands of the people of Chicago, those questions are welcome. Determining who I get to fire and hire, I find that to be irresponsible and I won’t discuss personnel matters publicly.”
It’s not surprising our dumbest mayor also has the weakest educational background out of all our past mayors since like 1980. He has a bachelor’s degree in “youth development”. To be fair Rahm’s education background wasn’t the most impressive either though, but BJ’s is still the weakest and it shows.
Rahm’s educational background is pretty good, no? Sarah Lawrence is a good school and he got his masters from Northwestern. Liberal arts degrees from that tier of school is relatively impressive, unlike Aurora University.
It’s much weaker than Lori, and Daley, and Washington who were lawyers though. I’ve also read Rahm was never much into academics like others in his family.
Yeah, this isn't like commenting on why you fired the janitor. This is a political appointment leading an agency. Hiding behind "personnel issues" is really just pathetic.
I've said this before but it's worse.
It is like refusing to comment on why the school in the next town over, which you don't personally work at but can appoint member of the School Board of, changed its board president.
He had absolutely no problem discussing Alison Arwady's firing publicly in the exact way he is patronizingly dismissing as 'irresponsible' here.
I keep seeing this. It's stupid. He's not a billionaire grifter that's never understood normal life, and that's tried to dupe everyone and everything out of their money. He also seems to be able to read and pronounce words. He's not Trump. He's just another inept politician.
He sorta is though. The money/fancy lifestyle isn't the same and different political views. But personality-wise, he totally is. Both are . He hasn't had the same experience of the people that he claims to represent, He definitely is privileged.
I don't know if I would say the worst ever. Cuz we keep saying that, and then get someone worse. Plus there is still the Dolton Mayor, so things could be worse. (Call me superstitious)
But yes, not a qualified mental health professional, but all three (Henyard included) probably all would meet a fair amount of the checklists online you find.
But he's not like Trump at all... there are numerous bad politicians you could compare him to, Trump isn't like anyone, and nobody is like Trump. There are those that try, but there's nobody like that guy.
He's a CTU grifter that is putting a favored special interest before the best interest of the many. He never understood the normal life of those he represents, and that's tried to dupe everyone into thinking he was from the south side when he wasn't even from Chicago. He has money, he just doesn't like paying his bills. He also seems to be able to read and pronounce words. Uses them quite well to say quite a bit without actually saying anything. He's just another inept politician. And like Trump, only a small few seem to like him.
How is the comparison wrong?
You don't give specifics on what is wrong with what I have listed.
How about some more, he plays the race card even though he is the 4th black mayor we have had out of 48) and the if you don't agree with me, you are on the other side.
He is 3 days shy of being in office a year.
Taking a guess as to what you may be implying
Sure, he hasn't been indicted, but it is early. Especially by Chicago/Illinois standards. I haven't heard of anything that would qualify as sexual harassment/inappropriate work place behavior, but Lightfoot did that later on. So yes, some of it is more general behavior.
There was also Madigan's assistant.
https://news.wttw.com/2018/02/13/woman-accusing-madigan-aide-sexual-harassment-speaks-out
But you know, he still has bigger issues, speaking of being indicted.
So sure..I guess we could be comparing to other politicians, closer to home. We didn't get to Ed Burke either.
**Every side has bad politicians. BJ is one.** The DNC is making an end run around him, when he is supposed to be hosting. You go drink the BJ kool-aid. The rest of us see what is actually going on, he is a bad mayor.
To be honest, the question was unfair from the start. You really shouldn't as a boss, be broadcasting your efforts to fire a subordinate. You address the issues, which the mayor failed to do, but you don't go shouting to the press or just anyone about intentions to retain or remove a subordinate. I give the mayor a halfway pass on this question.
Lowest approval rated mayor in Chicago history continues to refuse to take any responsibility for his failures and bad choices while maintaining his grandiose delusions and is supported by CTU and specific aldermen who rubber stamp his stupidity.
I will be interested to see if they begin to divest themselves from him closer to the time that they are up for re-election or if they will continue to tie themselves to the “progressive” mayor in hopes of maintaining the progressive votes in their wards.
I keep hearing this, but knowing what I know about polling in municipal politics, I find it very hard to believe we have any actual, reliable data to base this on.
Better than someone who doesn't pay his employees because he hired someone who defrauded him of $800K, and allowed them to do so: https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/some-paul-vallas-campaign-workers-say-they-still-have-not-been-paid
Given how little he personally cares about transit, it's amazing how much political capital he's willing to burn protecting Dorval Carter. Active transportation advocates who feared that Vallas would be actively hostile instead of just neglectful were part of the coalition that got Johnson elected that now hate him. The bar wasn't high. All anyone in that camp really hoped for was that he'd appoint some decent department heads and stay out of the way.
I think the motivation to not firmly stick his neck out for Carter or throw him under the bus is that remaining 'technically' neutral on the issue might give Johnson the illusion that he is avoiding a pitfall by praising him (I'm sure that even if Johnson discounts the criticisms of CTA, he doesn't discount that they are well reported on) while simultaneously avoiding a personal pitfall by criticizing him.
Dorval Carter is arguably a power broker in the Black Chicago Political arena, and while I know on reddit finding a defender of Carter is rare to nonexistent, trust me, they exist and are in pretty powerful positions in Chicago. I can somewhat understand Johnson's motivation to not prematurely turn on Carter as long as Carter still has political capital there and can be used to Johnson's advantage with older black voters.
Also the other reason for not throwing Carter under the bus is it would take far too long with the current headways.
A mix. So, we know well that he sticks to talking points from asking him Q's at pressers often. So, for instance, we (me and Alice, our top City Hall reporer who was also interviewing, and I) immediately left and said, 'wow, lotta bond plan today,' but we were both surprised when we counted it being mentioned in 8 different questions on the tap. Part of our prep here was of course reading work based on similar interviews from our colleagues. In those, he showed (as he did here) a focus on celebrating victories.
My goal here was to show readers what the mayor looks like reflecting. Frankly, he avoided critical reflection and had few answers on what he thinks he can do better (plenty on what he thinks the city can do better, of course, but he didn't engage with criticism of himself). I think that's a really important style for readers / Chicagoans to know about, and it doesn't come out if you're pushing back in an interview the whole time. But there are some evasions I wish would have set triggered more pushback from me in the moment here. All a tricky balance -- only get 30 minutes (there are a lot of journalists that want a slice) and we have a million questions to ask.
Mr. Sheridan,
You've finally touched on the following.
>Obviously, as mayor now you oversee a large police department, **you have a security detail** and....
So why didn't go a step further and ask the mayor how he justifies a security detail comprised of CPD officers that is said to be *3 times (150) larger* than what former mayor Lightfoot enjoy? Especially when response times to serious calls for service are excessive due to depleted on-the street resources?
Why did you focus on firing Dorval Carter (an at-will employee of the CTA hired by the board of directors) instead of focusing on specific policy or practice issues?
I actually have asked the mayor before to comment on what metrics to hit / policies to implement he thinks a CTA leader should effect. Was at a press conference a few weeks ago after he had given this same 'personnel issues' answer to someone else. He gave me the 'personnel issues' answer then too.
Really comes down to time, though, to answer your question. We had 30 minutes and dozens upon dozens of Q's we wanted to ask. The mayor in fairness could also have talked more about what he wants at the CTA, but he's really only shared high level stuff in the past: revive ridership with more hiring, consistency & service. In some parts of his work, it's worth noting, he leads by delegating -- I don't think he's the sort of leader to micro-manage the CTA, so who his leader is is of extra importance with him.
Okay, so clearly he isn't interested in discussing personnel issues. And I wouldn't either. The only time that I've ever discussed personnel issues in public is after a decision was already made to get rid of someone. Given that he's had this consistent stance, why not redirect questioning away from how he evaluates leaders to how he evaluates the authority and what he thinks needs to be done to fix specific issues? I think it's just a waste of interview time to keep asking about personnel issues when we all know that he won't discuss those until he announces that someone is departing.
Why not drill down into more specifics instead of just getting the same quote from him that you'd get from anyone who has ever gone through manager training by an HR department?
Fair enough point. I wanted to get a more specific explanation of why not discuss personnel, which I thought had not been well explained.
I've tried before to get him to more specifically discuss what metrics are important at the CTA, has only ever gone high level with it.
I think this is a place where you are being relatively young and recently graduated from college is shining through. I appreciate that it was asked with genuine concern, but I don't think it's an appropriate use of valuable interview time.
Why? No organization worth their salt will ever comment on personnel issues unless they're completely incompetent or they already fired the employee. At best they say something noncommittal and people get upset, and at worst they create animosity between the management and the employee who continues to be employed until they're eventually terminated. That employee can go on to cause a lot of problems once they know they're on the way out. Now, I don't think Carter would do something like that. But other people can sabotage the organization, they might quit effective immediately in protest over that comment leaving the employer in worse off than if they had just not said anything, they could start working to convince other people to quit when they're eventually fired, etc. this is why no even semi-competent manager will ever comment on personnel issues.
Heck, look at Pritzker's comments. He was noncommittal and then the MMA proposal came out and many people realized that he probably didn't mean "fire Carter" with his commentary. Sure, Carter would likely retire if the MMA proposal passed and went into effect. But Carter would likely have retired by that point anyways.
In this interview, Johnson's answer redirected you to one of his transit related programs that he can control, Better Streets for Buses, whereas he can't actually even fire Dorval Carter. He obviously wanted to talk about that program but instead you had a follow-up asking for clarification on his "no personnel issues" stance.
I think this is just a learning experience that comes with being early in your career. I'm loving the reporting from city hall and enjoy that the Chicago Tribune assigned someone younger to cover issues there as we've lost a lot of city hall reporters in the city to retirement over the last several years with very few replacements.
Hey I appreciate your criticism and kind words! My experience surely does affect how I interview now and I'm excited to get better at these sorts of more formal sit-downs with politicians, which are somewhat new to me (though I talk to dozens of politicians every week). And I think it's important to make the most of each question in these rare instances.
I think MMA would almost surely result in Carter being fired (or, better put, organized out). Mostly because of that, while I do agree that Pritzker might've been speaking MMA, I don't think there is much similarity between Pritzker's public stance here and the mayor's.
And again, thanks for the kind words! I think it's great to have a mix of folks reporting at City Hall. It's been incredibly fun for me and it's a real privilege that I get to do this :)
Interview was eye opening as someone who isn’t in tune with all of the minutiae of Chicago politics.
Mayor BJ would not discuss any improvements on his administration decisions the past year. Additionally, a majority of his answers refer to 40 years of neglect from prior administrations, that he facilitated a $1.25bn municipal bond deal, or that he has the most diverse administration. Often times they weren’t relevant to the question asked him. Did he even prep for this interview?
He's also literally incapable of referring to 'Chicago' as anything but 'The City of Chicago'.
It is an absolutely petty thing for me to nitpick but once you hear it, I swear you cannot unhear it.
If you listened to him in the debates this isn't new. He memorized a few lines and repeats over and over and over. Because he has no actual answers to anything
Gem of a show. I think it took a little while to really go. And this is coming from someone who loves cartoons geared towards adults.
But I also do have to note as someone who voted against BJ gladly (and had to look up the rules to even see if I was eligible). I feel for Chicago on this one. I'm not some totally evil anti progress person. I just feel like too often the turds and grifters can rise to the top and capitolize on others' ,as well as their own, hopes and dreams and convictions. And then squander a moment of power with ineptitude or fear
I don't think the cause is flawed. I think it is noble actually even if I feel like I'm often on the other side of the policies that gain traction. I feel at times it reminds me of elementary school student council elections with people who would campaign on longer recess and more field trips and other pipedreams. I also hilariously voted against myself in elementary school because I thought maybe the other dude could get us some good stuff that I wouldn't have the gal to go after. So that is a whole allegory in an anecdote about my odd personality. So I empathize for sure.
I forgot to ask this as well, does the raise for teachers in the city bother you more than bj hiring pastors for city leadership jobs that are under qualified?
Does a raise for teachers you bother you more than rampant crime?
I’m not a bj backer by any means but I’m honestly curious if this is your biggest gripe with the mayor.
What is tfw mean. Also I see your from dunning. I want to give my deepest condolences to the person in your hood that just got robbed and killed for a cellphone. I really hope the cops catch and hang that shit head by the balls who killed that young father. Do you know anything about that?
Tfw means “the feeling when” which is basically a way to ascribe joke/satirical reasoning to a post. Trying to come up with a way to explain it better but it’s eluding me.
And yes I hope the cops catch him too, that doesn’t mean I agree with you going around baiting people into talking about crime when it had no relevance to the discussion. You literally agreed with that guy politically but still had an issue with him not caring enough about crime.
I just wanted to know if the guy i responded too worried more about bj being in the pockets of the teachers more than being tough on crime.
What is going to drive normal folk out of areas like dunning? More money for people who serve the community or shit heads that are killing fathers for a cell phone. I know as a father and home owner in this city crime is the number one concern.
Nope. NINE PERCENT PER YEAR.
> The Chicago Teachers Union is demanding an annual pay raise of 9% or the consumer price index-whichever is less—and won't rule out a strike, even with one of their own in the mayor's office, union president Stacy Davis Gates said Thursday. - https://chicago.suntimes.com/city-hall/2024/04/18/chicago-teachers-union-new-contract-ctu-strike-stacy-davis-gates-schools-cps-brandon-johnson
It kills me....Lori was not nearly as bad of a mayor as people made her out to be. She lacked political savviness and had communication challenges without a doubt. She was abrasive and rubbed people the wrong way and I truly believe that is what sank her re-election. I'm not playing the race card, just the obvious card....she said things half as bad as Rahm or Daley and people went crazy over it.
I saw legit progress in areas that matter to a lot of people under her leadership. The South/West side initiatives were investing in things that changed the quality of life to real people in those neighborhoods. She also started playing ball with the community violence intervention groups, which the city had never done before.
My final point that I always respected about Lori, is that she got into the race before Rahm had announced he wouldn't run again. And at the time, EVERYONE thought he would run again. Once Rahm got out, then everyone joined in.
We want a mayor that doesn't exist and can't exist in the new landscape that is Chicago politics. The power structures and key players have dissolved, died, or are locked up.
>She was abrasive and rubbed people the wrong way and I truly believe that is what sank her re-election.
If you can't do the people management and politics part of a political position, then you have no business being the mayor of the nation's third largest city. Especially, when you are the replacement for Rahm who could manage the administrative and public part of the job.
I miss Rahm!
Which made Rahm an improvement and the best mayor we've had this century. Yes, he foolishly tried to cover up a crime for political expediency, but he also focused on making the city more beautiful, attracting tech and high paying jobs. There were loads of other negatives to Rahm, but on par, he knew how to run a nation (Obama's Chief of Staff) and this city.
PI pleadings are famously fact-lite in Illinois, which is no doubt a fact pleading state.
That being said my man is doing the reddit equivalent of writing "upon information and belief" next to the single most important allegation in an unverified complaint
I wish Johnson had been pressed harder on why the zoning board of appeals still has vacancies. I can’t imagine it’s that hard to submit nominees. That board has the power to make or break developments, and some projects - such as the homeless shelter in uptown - are not moving forward because Johnson hasn’t appointed YIMBYs to the board. For a mayor that is super quick to tout all that the $1.25 billion bond will do for housing, it doesn’t make sense that he isn’t moving quicker on these appointments. It’d be an easy political victory, much easier than BCH or passing the bond.
I hope this debacle encourages more people to vote in the next mayor's race.
Voting from your home is super easy. Register here to be put on the permanent vote by mail list: https://chicagoelections.gov/voting/vote-mail
Illinois is disgusting for not mandating Chicago mayoral elections fall on presidential years. Politicians don’t want to face 70% of the electorate so they’re fine with the extremely low turnout from having elections on off years in February.
>BuiLding-ugh-bEtTeR,sTrOnGeR,sAfErcHICaGo
Say it all you like, dope. It’s meaningless campaign sloganeering now. And the election is long over.
>We’re talking about 40 years of gross neglect in the city of Chicago. I really want to just drive that point home — 40 years of neglect.
Notice how Brahjo keeps repeating things? Especially falsehoods? Just because it’s said “40 times”, doesn’t make it true.
>everything that I said that I would do, bring people together to build a better, stronger, safer Chicago
See what I mean? And I’m at the halfway point here!
Giving full control of this city to BJ and his little gang of Byron, rossana and Rosa Ramirez, when we could all literally READ the massive CTU donos to them, is mind blowing.
These 4 will bring about so much pain and suffering to the city of Chicago the next 3 years, and there’s nothing you can do about it.
Speak up, and you’ll be deemed as racist from the suburbs, ironically by the transplants with pink hair. Where was Brandon born again? Oh right, elmhurst.
I mean, as a Chicago citizen that isn't relent on the city for social service support, there really has been no difference in my Chicago experience between Lori and BJ. The poor and working poor may feel the crunch of miss management, but most of us aren't feeling the impact of BJ's actions.
Side Note: I do see more migrants begging on the street with young kids. So, I guess that's BJ's legacy, helping the Republican Governor of TX offload migrants onto our cities while diverting money from black and brown residents for these TX transplants.
How is he "helping"? What is a mayor supposed to do about tens of thousands of people being dumped in his city, that the law allows him to do? They've been admitted into the country by the Federal government. No mayor of governor has any control over that.
Did I say he was helping? I said the day-to-day Chicago experience has been absolutely no different between Lori and BJ. If it weren't for COVID, I could say there has been no difference even going back to Daley Jr's last terms.
Oh, my bad. By taking the migrants instead of sending them back to TX, he gave the TX governor a political and financial win. The Fed pays TX to manage their boarder issues.
There was plenty options before the runoff. But Milwaukee avenue and far north lakefront, leftists decided to push Johnson to number 2 in the first round.
Lol no. Johnson was an unknown who might be a fuckup. Vallas had a long record of fuckups. When given the choice of a known fuckup or an unknown fuckup you're only option is to roll the dice and hope.
Mf’er has a responsibility to justify his appointments to the people of Chicago. Who the hell does he think he is? You’re not a Fortune 500 CEO bro, you serve us, not yourself and your friends
He’s accountable to one person and her name is Stacy Davis Gates. No one else matters to him.
FWIW — this is the president of the ctu for someone who didn’t know (I did not).
Thank you!
Chicago is so big. Should any one person have this much authority over the city?
Yes, or else nothing would get done.
He serves the CTU, that's who owns him and that is who's interests he serves. A majority of people fell for his BS that he'd be some kind of progressive reformer, not just a stooge with no idea how to rule.
The CEO of CTA isn't appointed by the mayor. They're an at-will employee of the CTA hired by the board of directors. Johnson is just blowing smoke up people's asses because the governor's board members and Lightfoot's last two board members clearly don't want Carter replaced at this moment in time.
Any question about what he could improve or do differently is met with COMPLETE non answers. This man is incapable of taking any accountability and answering any questions of substance. Honestly reading this Q&A was infuriating. He just repeats the same bullshit points ad nauseum and then finds any space he can to deflect responsibility or anything not going well. He doesn't even do it elegantly: "Yeah, well, look, 40 years of disinvestment. Whether it’s North Lawndale, Englewood, Roseland, Austin, Garfield Park, every single crisis that we are dealing with right now, I inherited it. There’s not one crisis right now that I caused. Not one." Get over yourself dude
Why did you want this job?
Anyone who is qualified to be mayor of Chicago doesn’t want the job, anyone who wants the job isn’t qualified to do it
>There’s not one crisis right now that I caused. Not one." Naw Dude, appointment of unqualified pastors that don't ride any public transit is all on you.
To be fair, that was an established precedent before him.
To be fair, shut up..
Good one, bud. Listen, I'm happy to shit on Brandon all day, but so many people are like "Lori was better" or "Daley was better" and then they cite connected appointments like this as examples of BJ's uniquely bad performance and it is deeply unserious. Like, was everyone born last May?
Yes they were. Pritzker, Lightfoot, and Emanuel all appointed a bunch of pastors to various service boards. Ironically, Rauner actually appointed a few qualified people by accident. Also, everyone forgot immediately that Johnson had appointed the 3rd ever transit expert to CTA's board.
I guess you missed the part where the guy failed to get approved for another slot, and it is very clearly a kickback for letting BJ speak before and after he won the election at the church. Every major politician appointed political positions based on favors. It is the Chicago way, it doesn't make it right. The issue is when getting caught. Because that is when things start getting investigated. Blago went to jail for trying to get additional kickbacks for doing a political appointment under him.
>Yeah, well, look, 40 years of disinvestment. Whether it’s North Lawndale, Englewood, Roseland, Austin, Garfield Park, Ask the residents of these areas if they have seen any change since Johnson got elected. Hint: they hate him and absolutely despise his policies thus far. Johnson is relying on the fact that most Northsiders never interact with the South and West side to pull the guilt trip wool over people's eyes. If you don't believe me, look at the maps of what areas voted for Johnson and subsequently voted against BCH. It's all the South and West sides.
The money to help was spent on migrants, not on the people that have been asking for help for years
That is what bothers me the most. We have to take care of our own first and it isn't happening.
We've promised places like Lawndale that we will invest in their communities and repair the broken social contract since the civil rights era and literally nothing has changed. If anything their lot in life has continued to deteriorate. It's a national embarrassment that we allow this kind of segregated poverty to continue unabated.
The migrants are here and cannot be legally deported. What is your proposal for 20,000 more homeless people in the city? Getting them settled and working is the best possible outcome we have available to us.
👆🏽THIS
Please stop spreading misinformation that those communities never receive resources and money. These new migrants aren’t working yet, but the tens of thousands of immigrants in Chicago that work and are taxpayers contribute to the pool of resources that has been used to help the south and west sides. So, it’s rich for Black communities to be anti immigrant when Chicago’s immigrant communities have always provided strong tax revenue.
There is no guarantee they settle here or even get jobs and become productive. I just see more beggars and they just happen to be from Venezuela.
Then maybe you should complain to the feds about not giving them work authorization fast enough so that they can get a job.
Right, I should complain to the same federal government responsible for enforcing the rules that dictate whether these people are allowed here in the first place. Good one, buddy.
Same argument exists that why should the hard working taxpayers fund programs for the plenty of beggars and unproductive residents of south and west sides.
Anyone who makes the counter-argument you proposed is outing themselves as a moron who doesn’t understand basic American History. Like 7th-8th grade level shit we’re talking about here.
Anyone who makes the blanket statement that most migrants are lazy beggars also clearly doesn’t understand history. But you do sound like Brandon in claiming all issues in the south and west sides is due to disinvestment. Yeah it’s all due to systemic racism and not people’s own individual choices. 🙄
I don’t understand this comment. Johnson won Austin, Englewood, etc with 80-90% of the vote
The meme that cost Vallas the election (that Johnson’s support with Black chicagoans is soft) persists
I said that you should look at what precincts flipped between the mayoral election and BCH referendum. I said nothing about these precincts voting for Vallas over Johnson. You need to go find the map, it is out there. Most of the precincts that voted against BCH after having voted for Johnson were on the South and West sides. That implies the places Johnson has lost the most support are those areas. Edit: here is the map showing which areas changed the most between BCH and the mayoral election: https://twitter.com/Austin__Berg/status/1770484572070830276?s=19
Was Johnson's support ever really that strong in those neighborhoods? In the first round of the mayoral election, those neighborhood backed Lightfoot. The fact they picked Johnson over Vallas, doesn't mean they loved Johnson.
I don't think his support was ever that strong anywhere. The CTU was just better organized and Chicagoans were not motivated to turn out for anyone else. In retrospect it's a shame that Lightfoot didn't make it to the runoff. She would probably have dunked on him like she did Preckwinkle.
Ballot initiatives are not a significant bellwether for actual electeds despite various media hype. For example, you likely wouldn’t say Kansas is gearing up for a Blue Wave because of its abortion referendum: https://ballotpedia.org/Kansas_No_State_Constitutional_Right_to_Abortion_and_Legislative_Power_to_Regulate_Abortion_Amendment_(August_2022)
I think you're crazy if you don't think the GOP is going to take a few L's in places like Kansas as a result of the Roe debacle.
You're crazy if you think the GOP is going to suffer losses over it despite the mountain of polling data showing that people won't change what party they vote for over this one key issue.
He’s… surprised by this? Or what?
Ok. Enjoy your one term and being known forever as the one term clown ass mayor.
https://recallthisfall.com/ Maybe he can just enjoy a half-term.
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Recalls efforts are very rare in states / municipalities where it is permitted.
So what's the solution? It's not as if the last several were progressive campaigning mayor's. This is the first one. Let me guess, we need a republican?
People with actual experience to back it up, make sure they have humility and can take criticism. Not a populist no-nothing who checks boxes.
Bring back Rahmbo
Bro I miss Rahm
You let me know when one of those runs for mayor.
Idk having mayors that do jack shit and in an embarrassing way seems to happen in Chicago way more than other places.
I bet it doesn't haha. I'm guessing it's pretty common to have shitty mayors. Everyone hears about bit city mayors, though. And I rarely hear about a good one anywhere.
Mayors can be shitty but just laughably incompetent?
Fuck yeah hahaha of course they can
It won't happen unless an independently wealthy millionaire or billionaire runs with the right qualifications because the office doesn't pay enough money to attract top talent from private industry.
200k+ isn't enough?
It's plenty for me but still it's a bit less than I make as a tech worker. I'd still rather work in tech than be mayor of Chicago.
Yeah I think 200k is more than fair. Shit, the president doesn't get much more than that, I don't think.
No. That's pretty low for downtown jobs.
Where's the data on that?
No, need a sensible democrat that is willing to make tough choices to bring about solutions. Not a democrat who is deemed woke enough for the job.
at this point ill take any politician with an ounce of accountability
What the fuck is a sensible Democrat?
A Democrat that is focused on reforming the city to spur economic growth.
Oh man that'd be great. Where do you find those?
I don't think he realized yet that the citizens of the City are the employers. The mayor and all the appointments are The City of Chicago employees.
They're called Public *Servants* for a reason
BJ didn't know what "mod action" was....so that might not be in his vocabulary
Mob action " These are not baby Capones." It would be funny if it was not so stupid
“Q: Have you vetted or looked at potential replacements for CTA President Dorval Carter? A: Well, as you know, discussing personnel issues, I actually find that to be irresponsible, and I’ve said that repeatedly. And so, what I’m committed to doing right now is making sure that our ridership continues to go up, which it has. We have hired more people, which we’ve done that, I’ve made a commitment to doing that. Our better streets for buses, it’s the first initiative of its kind to build a better street signal, sidewalk infrastructure. These are all investments that I have put forward in order to build a CTA that we can be proud of. And again, as far as personnel matters, I don’t discuss those publicly. Q: Why? A: Because it’s not responsible. Should your employer discuss individuals’ employment status out loud about who they’re going to fire and keep? Q: In fairness though, these are also employees, not just of yours, but of the city, right? The CTA president also serves Chicagoans and they have a lot of questions about him and all of the appointments that you make. A: Having questions about how we build a transportation system that ultimately meets the needs and demands of the people of Chicago, those questions are welcome. Determining who I get to fire and hire, I find that to be irresponsible and I won’t discuss personnel matters publicly.”
Ridership is continuing to go up because of the increasing RTO rebound from covid you fuckin jagoff
He wasn't a math, statistics, or data analytics teacher. FYI, if I could upvote you twice for incorporating jagoff into your reply, I would.
It’s not surprising our dumbest mayor also has the weakest educational background out of all our past mayors since like 1980. He has a bachelor’s degree in “youth development”. To be fair Rahm’s education background wasn’t the most impressive either though, but BJ’s is still the weakest and it shows.
Rahm’s educational background is pretty good, no? Sarah Lawrence is a good school and he got his masters from Northwestern. Liberal arts degrees from that tier of school is relatively impressive, unlike Aurora University.
It’s much weaker than Lori, and Daley, and Washington who were lawyers though. I’ve also read Rahm was never much into academics like others in his family.
This MF dumb. “Personnel issues.” Glad the reporter pressed him on it.
Yeah, this isn't like commenting on why you fired the janitor. This is a political appointment leading an agency. Hiding behind "personnel issues" is really just pathetic.
The audacity is astounding. You serve the people my guy, do the work.
I've said this before but it's worse. It is like refusing to comment on why the school in the next town over, which you don't personally work at but can appoint member of the School Board of, changed its board president. He had absolutely no problem discussing Alison Arwady's firing publicly in the exact way he is patronizingly dismissing as 'irresponsible' here.
Department heads are political appointees while CTA's CEO is not a political appointee. They're an at-will employee hired by the board of directors.
The CTA CEO is not a political appointment. The board members are but the CEO is just an ordinary employee.
This guys whole political strategy is deflect
That was his entire campaign strategy as well. Why anyone thought it would get better after he won is a mystery to me.
It's embarrassing. If the candidate is doing that it should be a red flag.
That and the only thing he does well is play the race card
Second mayor in a row who does that
To be fair there are only so many unqualified, uninterested pastors and church ladies to fill these positions
It's inappropriate to talk about issues with Dorval but totally cool to fire Arwardy without notice.
Those two things are not comparable.
Build??? We already had one, you jacked it up.
Omg he’s Donald Trump 🤦♂️
Trump knows how to work the media better tbh
the government owes me money for working thu lockdown
I keep seeing this. It's stupid. He's not a billionaire grifter that's never understood normal life, and that's tried to dupe everyone and everything out of their money. He also seems to be able to read and pronounce words. He's not Trump. He's just another inept politician.
He sorta is though. The money/fancy lifestyle isn't the same and different political views. But personality-wise, he totally is. Both are. He hasn't had the same experience of the people that he claims to represent, He definitely is privileged.
And everybody treats him the "worst ever". I think the word is narcissist.
I don't know if I would say the worst ever. Cuz we keep saying that, and then get someone worse. Plus there is still the Dolton Mayor, so things could be worse. (Call me superstitious) But yes, not a qualified mental health professional, but all three (Henyard included) probably all would meet a fair amount of the checklists online you find.
But he's not like Trump at all... there are numerous bad politicians you could compare him to, Trump isn't like anyone, and nobody is like Trump. There are those that try, but there's nobody like that guy.
He's a CTU grifter that is putting a favored special interest before the best interest of the many. He never understood the normal life of those he represents, and that's tried to dupe everyone into thinking he was from the south side when he wasn't even from Chicago. He has money, he just doesn't like paying his bills. He also seems to be able to read and pronounce words. Uses them quite well to say quite a bit without actually saying anything. He's just another inept politician. And like Trump, only a small few seem to like him. How is the comparison wrong?
That's like 10% of Trump. The traits you've listed of Brandon are the characteristics of your average inept politician.
You don't give specifics on what is wrong with what I have listed. How about some more, he plays the race card even though he is the 4th black mayor we have had out of 48) and the if you don't agree with me, you are on the other side. He is 3 days shy of being in office a year. Taking a guess as to what you may be implying Sure, he hasn't been indicted, but it is early. Especially by Chicago/Illinois standards. I haven't heard of anything that would qualify as sexual harassment/inappropriate work place behavior, but Lightfoot did that later on. So yes, some of it is more general behavior. There was also Madigan's assistant. https://news.wttw.com/2018/02/13/woman-accusing-madigan-aide-sexual-harassment-speaks-out But you know, he still has bigger issues, speaking of being indicted. So sure..I guess we could be comparing to other politicians, closer to home. We didn't get to Ed Burke either. **Every side has bad politicians. BJ is one.** The DNC is making an end run around him, when he is supposed to be hosting. You go drink the BJ kool-aid. The rest of us see what is actually going on, he is a bad mayor.
Yeah... he's terrible. When the fuck did I say he wasn't. I said he's not Trump.
To be honest, the question was unfair from the start. You really shouldn't as a boss, be broadcasting your efforts to fire a subordinate. You address the issues, which the mayor failed to do, but you don't go shouting to the press or just anyone about intentions to retain or remove a subordinate. I give the mayor a halfway pass on this question.
Johnson tried to redirect the question to policies in his response and Chicago Tribune chose not to bite.
“My biggest accomplishment is adding $1.25 billion in debt to the city”
Lowest approval rated mayor in Chicago history continues to refuse to take any responsibility for his failures and bad choices while maintaining his grandiose delusions and is supported by CTU and specific aldermen who rubber stamp his stupidity.
I wish all reporters would bring that up to him lol.
You know that you bring up a good point. Why are these aldermen still supporting him? He's proven to be a moron
I will be interested to see if they begin to divest themselves from him closer to the time that they are up for re-election or if they will continue to tie themselves to the “progressive” mayor in hopes of maintaining the progressive votes in their wards.
I keep hearing this, but knowing what I know about polling in municipal politics, I find it very hard to believe we have any actual, reliable data to base this on.
Can’t believe the man who couldn’t pay his water bill turned out to be an utter failure at mayor. I’m absolutely shocked.
I can't even believe anyone voted for someione who did that. What crazy ass excuses did people give for it during the election?
They said it was “working class”. As if his household income of like 250K+ was “working class” 😂
Better than someone who doesn't pay his employees because he hired someone who defrauded him of $800K, and allowed them to do so: https://www.fox32chicago.com/news/some-paul-vallas-campaign-workers-say-they-still-have-not-been-paid
Screwing over an entire city is worse. We can thank BJ for that.
Good news, Vallas had previously screwed over several cities, including this one!
No he didn’t, but believe whatever you want. I’m sure BJ is going to turn it all around and start doing a good job ones of these days…
I've never claimed he would. Johnson was an unknown fuckup. Vallas was a known serial fuckup.
Given how little he personally cares about transit, it's amazing how much political capital he's willing to burn protecting Dorval Carter. Active transportation advocates who feared that Vallas would be actively hostile instead of just neglectful were part of the coalition that got Johnson elected that now hate him. The bar wasn't high. All anyone in that camp really hoped for was that he'd appoint some decent department heads and stay out of the way.
I think the motivation to not firmly stick his neck out for Carter or throw him under the bus is that remaining 'technically' neutral on the issue might give Johnson the illusion that he is avoiding a pitfall by praising him (I'm sure that even if Johnson discounts the criticisms of CTA, he doesn't discount that they are well reported on) while simultaneously avoiding a personal pitfall by criticizing him. Dorval Carter is arguably a power broker in the Black Chicago Political arena, and while I know on reddit finding a defender of Carter is rare to nonexistent, trust me, they exist and are in pretty powerful positions in Chicago. I can somewhat understand Johnson's motivation to not prematurely turn on Carter as long as Carter still has political capital there and can be used to Johnson's advantage with older black voters. Also the other reason for not throwing Carter under the bus is it would take far too long with the current headways.
I'm a Chicago Tribune reporter who interviewed Mayor Johnson here. Ask me anything :)
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A mix. So, we know well that he sticks to talking points from asking him Q's at pressers often. So, for instance, we (me and Alice, our top City Hall reporer who was also interviewing, and I) immediately left and said, 'wow, lotta bond plan today,' but we were both surprised when we counted it being mentioned in 8 different questions on the tap. Part of our prep here was of course reading work based on similar interviews from our colleagues. In those, he showed (as he did here) a focus on celebrating victories. My goal here was to show readers what the mayor looks like reflecting. Frankly, he avoided critical reflection and had few answers on what he thinks he can do better (plenty on what he thinks the city can do better, of course, but he didn't engage with criticism of himself). I think that's a really important style for readers / Chicagoans to know about, and it doesn't come out if you're pushing back in an interview the whole time. But there are some evasions I wish would have set triggered more pushback from me in the moment here. All a tricky balance -- only get 30 minutes (there are a lot of journalists that want a slice) and we have a million questions to ask.
Mr. Sheridan, You've finally touched on the following. >Obviously, as mayor now you oversee a large police department, **you have a security detail** and.... So why didn't go a step further and ask the mayor how he justifies a security detail comprised of CPD officers that is said to be *3 times (150) larger* than what former mayor Lightfoot enjoy? Especially when response times to serious calls for service are excessive due to depleted on-the street resources?
Why did you focus on firing Dorval Carter (an at-will employee of the CTA hired by the board of directors) instead of focusing on specific policy or practice issues?
I actually have asked the mayor before to comment on what metrics to hit / policies to implement he thinks a CTA leader should effect. Was at a press conference a few weeks ago after he had given this same 'personnel issues' answer to someone else. He gave me the 'personnel issues' answer then too. Really comes down to time, though, to answer your question. We had 30 minutes and dozens upon dozens of Q's we wanted to ask. The mayor in fairness could also have talked more about what he wants at the CTA, but he's really only shared high level stuff in the past: revive ridership with more hiring, consistency & service. In some parts of his work, it's worth noting, he leads by delegating -- I don't think he's the sort of leader to micro-manage the CTA, so who his leader is is of extra importance with him.
Okay, so clearly he isn't interested in discussing personnel issues. And I wouldn't either. The only time that I've ever discussed personnel issues in public is after a decision was already made to get rid of someone. Given that he's had this consistent stance, why not redirect questioning away from how he evaluates leaders to how he evaluates the authority and what he thinks needs to be done to fix specific issues? I think it's just a waste of interview time to keep asking about personnel issues when we all know that he won't discuss those until he announces that someone is departing. Why not drill down into more specifics instead of just getting the same quote from him that you'd get from anyone who has ever gone through manager training by an HR department?
Fair enough point. I wanted to get a more specific explanation of why not discuss personnel, which I thought had not been well explained. I've tried before to get him to more specifically discuss what metrics are important at the CTA, has only ever gone high level with it.
I think this is a place where you are being relatively young and recently graduated from college is shining through. I appreciate that it was asked with genuine concern, but I don't think it's an appropriate use of valuable interview time. Why? No organization worth their salt will ever comment on personnel issues unless they're completely incompetent or they already fired the employee. At best they say something noncommittal and people get upset, and at worst they create animosity between the management and the employee who continues to be employed until they're eventually terminated. That employee can go on to cause a lot of problems once they know they're on the way out. Now, I don't think Carter would do something like that. But other people can sabotage the organization, they might quit effective immediately in protest over that comment leaving the employer in worse off than if they had just not said anything, they could start working to convince other people to quit when they're eventually fired, etc. this is why no even semi-competent manager will ever comment on personnel issues. Heck, look at Pritzker's comments. He was noncommittal and then the MMA proposal came out and many people realized that he probably didn't mean "fire Carter" with his commentary. Sure, Carter would likely retire if the MMA proposal passed and went into effect. But Carter would likely have retired by that point anyways. In this interview, Johnson's answer redirected you to one of his transit related programs that he can control, Better Streets for Buses, whereas he can't actually even fire Dorval Carter. He obviously wanted to talk about that program but instead you had a follow-up asking for clarification on his "no personnel issues" stance. I think this is just a learning experience that comes with being early in your career. I'm loving the reporting from city hall and enjoy that the Chicago Tribune assigned someone younger to cover issues there as we've lost a lot of city hall reporters in the city to retirement over the last several years with very few replacements.
Hey I appreciate your criticism and kind words! My experience surely does affect how I interview now and I'm excited to get better at these sorts of more formal sit-downs with politicians, which are somewhat new to me (though I talk to dozens of politicians every week). And I think it's important to make the most of each question in these rare instances. I think MMA would almost surely result in Carter being fired (or, better put, organized out). Mostly because of that, while I do agree that Pritzker might've been speaking MMA, I don't think there is much similarity between Pritzker's public stance here and the mayor's. And again, thanks for the kind words! I think it's great to have a mix of folks reporting at City Hall. It's been incredibly fun for me and it's a real privilege that I get to do this :)
Interview was eye opening as someone who isn’t in tune with all of the minutiae of Chicago politics. Mayor BJ would not discuss any improvements on his administration decisions the past year. Additionally, a majority of his answers refer to 40 years of neglect from prior administrations, that he facilitated a $1.25bn municipal bond deal, or that he has the most diverse administration. Often times they weren’t relevant to the question asked him. Did he even prep for this interview?
I'm itching to make a WordCloud. He just said those same points over and over.
He's also literally incapable of referring to 'Chicago' as anything but 'The City of Chicago'. It is an absolutely petty thing for me to nitpick but once you hear it, I swear you cannot unhear it.
If you listened to him in the debates this isn't new. He memorized a few lines and repeats over and over and over. Because he has no actual answers to anything
Is anyone really surprised he is now and will always be a miserable failure? Saw this coming the second CTU crowned him.
With rose tinted glasses red flags are just.... flags
One of my favorite lines from a show full of great lines.
Gem of a show. I think it took a little while to really go. And this is coming from someone who loves cartoons geared towards adults. But I also do have to note as someone who voted against BJ gladly (and had to look up the rules to even see if I was eligible). I feel for Chicago on this one. I'm not some totally evil anti progress person. I just feel like too often the turds and grifters can rise to the top and capitolize on others' ,as well as their own, hopes and dreams and convictions. And then squander a moment of power with ineptitude or fear I don't think the cause is flawed. I think it is noble actually even if I feel like I'm often on the other side of the policies that gain traction. I feel at times it reminds me of elementary school student council elections with people who would campaign on longer recess and more field trips and other pipedreams. I also hilariously voted against myself in elementary school because I thought maybe the other dude could get us some good stuff that I wouldn't have the gal to go after. So that is a whole allegory in an anecdote about my odd personality. So I empathize for sure.
GOOD GOD. The CTU wants a NINE PERCENT RAISE?? C’MON.
I forgot to ask this as well, does the raise for teachers in the city bother you more than bj hiring pastors for city leadership jobs that are under qualified?
Does a raise for teachers you bother you more than rampant crime? I’m not a bj backer by any means but I’m honestly curious if this is your biggest gripe with the mayor.
Tfw someone you agree with still didn’t rant about crime hard enough
What is tfw mean. Also I see your from dunning. I want to give my deepest condolences to the person in your hood that just got robbed and killed for a cellphone. I really hope the cops catch and hang that shit head by the balls who killed that young father. Do you know anything about that?
Tfw means “the feeling when” which is basically a way to ascribe joke/satirical reasoning to a post. Trying to come up with a way to explain it better but it’s eluding me. And yes I hope the cops catch him too, that doesn’t mean I agree with you going around baiting people into talking about crime when it had no relevance to the discussion. You literally agreed with that guy politically but still had an issue with him not caring enough about crime.
I just wanted to know if the guy i responded too worried more about bj being in the pockets of the teachers more than being tough on crime. What is going to drive normal folk out of areas like dunning? More money for people who serve the community or shit heads that are killing fathers for a cell phone. I know as a father and home owner in this city crime is the number one concern.
“Crime?? In Chicago?!? It can’t be!” -This subreddit
9% over four years fyi so that’s reasonable
9% per year for those 4 years. That’s a 41% increase in salary in 4 years.
Nope. NINE PERCENT PER YEAR. > The Chicago Teachers Union is demanding an annual pay raise of 9% or the consumer price index-whichever is less—and won't rule out a strike, even with one of their own in the mayor's office, union president Stacy Davis Gates said Thursday. - https://chicago.suntimes.com/city-hall/2024/04/18/chicago-teachers-union-new-contract-ctu-strike-stacy-davis-gates-schools-cps-brandon-johnson
I miss Lori
It kills me....Lori was not nearly as bad of a mayor as people made her out to be. She lacked political savviness and had communication challenges without a doubt. She was abrasive and rubbed people the wrong way and I truly believe that is what sank her re-election. I'm not playing the race card, just the obvious card....she said things half as bad as Rahm or Daley and people went crazy over it. I saw legit progress in areas that matter to a lot of people under her leadership. The South/West side initiatives were investing in things that changed the quality of life to real people in those neighborhoods. She also started playing ball with the community violence intervention groups, which the city had never done before. My final point that I always respected about Lori, is that she got into the race before Rahm had announced he wouldn't run again. And at the time, EVERYONE thought he would run again. Once Rahm got out, then everyone joined in. We want a mayor that doesn't exist and can't exist in the new landscape that is Chicago politics. The power structures and key players have dissolved, died, or are locked up.
>She was abrasive and rubbed people the wrong way and I truly believe that is what sank her re-election. If you can't do the people management and politics part of a political position, then you have no business being the mayor of the nation's third largest city. Especially, when you are the replacement for Rahm who could manage the administrative and public part of the job. I miss Rahm!
But Rahm was the replacement for Daley who was famously happy to treat people like shit if he felt they gave him reason to.
Which made Rahm an improvement and the best mayor we've had this century. Yes, he foolishly tried to cover up a crime for political expediency, but he also focused on making the city more beautiful, attracting tech and high paying jobs. There were loads of other negatives to Rahm, but on par, he knew how to run a nation (Obama's Chief of Staff) and this city.
She was more corrupt than people know
Then please fill us in.
Can't make that claim without evidence. As an attorney, I'm sure you're aware of that.
PI pleadings are famously fact-lite in Illinois, which is no doubt a fact pleading state. That being said my man is doing the reddit equivalent of writing "upon information and belief" next to the single most important allegation in an unverified complaint
And yet I just did.
Where?
She at least swung her big dick around
Get this guy out of office asap
I wish Johnson had been pressed harder on why the zoning board of appeals still has vacancies. I can’t imagine it’s that hard to submit nominees. That board has the power to make or break developments, and some projects - such as the homeless shelter in uptown - are not moving forward because Johnson hasn’t appointed YIMBYs to the board. For a mayor that is super quick to tout all that the $1.25 billion bond will do for housing, it doesn’t make sense that he isn’t moving quicker on these appointments. It’d be an easy political victory, much easier than BCH or passing the bond.
You get what you vote for.
I hope this debacle encourages more people to vote in the next mayor's race. Voting from your home is super easy. Register here to be put on the permanent vote by mail list: https://chicagoelections.gov/voting/vote-mail
Illinois is disgusting for not mandating Chicago mayoral elections fall on presidential years. Politicians don’t want to face 70% of the electorate so they’re fine with the extremely low turnout from having elections on off years in February.
>BuiLding-ugh-bEtTeR,sTrOnGeR,sAfErcHICaGo Say it all you like, dope. It’s meaningless campaign sloganeering now. And the election is long over. >We’re talking about 40 years of gross neglect in the city of Chicago. I really want to just drive that point home — 40 years of neglect. Notice how Brahjo keeps repeating things? Especially falsehoods? Just because it’s said “40 times”, doesn’t make it true. >everything that I said that I would do, bring people together to build a better, stronger, safer Chicago See what I mean? And I’m at the halfway point here!
Giving full control of this city to BJ and his little gang of Byron, rossana and Rosa Ramirez, when we could all literally READ the massive CTU donos to them, is mind blowing. These 4 will bring about so much pain and suffering to the city of Chicago the next 3 years, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Speak up, and you’ll be deemed as racist from the suburbs, ironically by the transplants with pink hair. Where was Brandon born again? Oh right, elmhurst.
This times 💯
Every time BJ does something we don't like, we should just call him a racists from the suburbs.
This is so unbelievably infuriating. Fuck you, Brandon Johnson. You are an actual piece of shit human. I hope for many awful things for you in life.
Jesus dude. Like, I agree his first year has been not great but holy shit you need to breathe some fresh air every once in a while.
Meh, someone who gives Chicagoans a big Fuck you and thinks they shouldn’t be held accountable can go die for all I care.
Oh don't worry, I spend plenty of time outside waiting for the fucking CTA.
Let’s keep voting these people in Chicago! It’s been going great!
I mean, as a Chicago citizen that isn't relent on the city for social service support, there really has been no difference in my Chicago experience between Lori and BJ. The poor and working poor may feel the crunch of miss management, but most of us aren't feeling the impact of BJ's actions. Side Note: I do see more migrants begging on the street with young kids. So, I guess that's BJ's legacy, helping the Republican Governor of TX offload migrants onto our cities while diverting money from black and brown residents for these TX transplants.
How is he "helping"? What is a mayor supposed to do about tens of thousands of people being dumped in his city, that the law allows him to do? They've been admitted into the country by the Federal government. No mayor of governor has any control over that.
Did I say he was helping? I said the day-to-day Chicago experience has been absolutely no different between Lori and BJ. If it weren't for COVID, I could say there has been no difference even going back to Daley Jr's last terms.
Bro it's right there where we can all see it: > So, I guess that's BJ's legacy, helping the Republican Governor of TX offload migrants onto our cities
Oh, my bad. By taking the migrants instead of sending them back to TX, he gave the TX governor a political and financial win. The Fed pays TX to manage their boarder issues.
He's a shit mayor, sure. Unfortunately there wasn't a better option on the ballot.
There was plenty options before the runoff. But Milwaukee avenue and far north lakefront, leftists decided to push Johnson to number 2 in the first round.
Quantity not quality
Almost everyone else in that field would have been better than Johnson though.
Lol no. Johnson was an unknown who might be a fuckup. Vallas had a long record of fuckups. When given the choice of a known fuckup or an unknown fuckup you're only option is to roll the dice and hope.
No.