Black Strawboss Lightfoot Out in Chicago: Which Candidate Will Elite White Liberals Select as the New Subvassal in Charge of Locking Up, Surveilling, Miseducating and Failing to Protect Black People?

BLACK BORG OUT. From [HERE] Mayor Lori Lightfoot lost her re-election bid by failing to garner enough votes to make a runoff election, a stunning fall for a candidate who had won all 50 of the city’s wards four years ago but had sparred with a powerful teachers union and been under fire for her response to rising crime.

The Associated Press declared Tuesday night that Paul Vallas, a more moderate Democrat who had won the support of the city’s police union, and Brandon Johnson, a liberal teachers union organizer, secured the two spots in April’s runoff election. 

Ms. Lightfoot, who ran in third place, conceded the race shortly before 9 p.m. local time, well before all votes were counted. It was the first time in 40 years that the city didn’t elect a sitting mayor who sought re-election. Ms. Lightfoot told supporters Tuesday that she had called Messrs. Vallas and Johnson to congratulate them and that she appreciated the love her supporters had shown her during the campaign.

After battling a pandemic, the teachers union and crime in the city, Ms. Lightfoot, 60 years old, faced a large field of opponents, with challengers on the left and right of her politically.

Mr. Vallas, a former public-school executive, Mr. Johnson, a Cook County Board Commissioner, and Jesús “Chuy” García, who currently serves in the U.S. Congress, were her main challengers. Mr. Garcia was in fourth place Tuesday night.“I am a lifelong Democrat,” Mr. Vallas said Tuesday night, listing what he said were his progressive credentials, and reiterating his focus on public safety and changing the city’s public schools as his top priorities.

Mr. Vallas also said if elected he would focus on the entire city, including those areas that have been neglected.

“I will not be a successful mayor until I’ve reversed the generations of disinvestments in Chicago’s poorest communities,” he said.

Mr. Vallas, 69, the grandson of Greek immigrants, served in the state legislature and then in the administration of longtime Mayor Richard M. Daley, including as head of Chicago’s public schools before running schools in other major cities. He has taken a tough-on-crime stance in the election and has staked out the wide-open political space to the right of Ms. Lightfoot. He has the backing of the Chicago police union, the Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 7.

The police union didn’t respond to a request for comment. [MORE]