Chicago's embattled Democrat Mayor Lori Lightfoot will soon be looking for a new job.
After finishing in third place on Tuesday, she's been eliminated from the race as it moves on to a runoff election on April 4 that includes only the first- and second-place candidates after no one in the nine-candidate field received a majority of votes.
Tuesday's outcome makes Lightfoot the first mayor of Chicago to lose a reelection bid in 40 years, likely not the kind of historic ending she hoped to have.
Lightfoot says she called Vallas and Johnson to concede, and says she will root for Chicago's next mayor, the city's 57th.
— Heather Cherone (@HeatherCherone) March 1, 2023
With more than 30 percent of the vote by the time Lightfoot conceded, former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas locked up enough support to finish in first place.
Vallas will now face Cook County Board of Commissioners member Brandon Johnson who, with more than 20 percent of the vote, finished second on Tuesday.
While those two move ahead to the runoff, Lightfoot — with around 16 percent of the vote — came up short and has been eliminated from the race along with U.S. Rep. Jesús "Chuy" Garcia, Chicago City Council members Sophia King and Roderick Sawyer, Kam Buckner, Ja'Mal Green, and Willie Wilson.
Vallas, notably, received the endorsement of the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police and made addressing crime a central issue of his campaign.
"Out of control crime and a lack of public safety impacts everyone in Chicago," Vallas' website states. "No matter where you live, you’ve surely seen a change for the worse in the past few years," it adds before asking Chicago residents to share their "crime story" with Vallas.
In a campaign and a city gripped by rising crime, it seems his message resonated with voters. Johnson also noted rising violent crime that "traumatizes our neighborhood" in his campaign, though the solutions presented by both Johnson and Vallas are tainted with social justice buzzwords and leftist policies that won't ultimately solve Chicago's crime crisis. It's hard to imagine, though, that any policies could be as detrimental to public safety as Lightfoot's have been. Time will tell.
As for Lightfoot, we'll have to wait and see what she moves on to next. An appointment in the Biden administration? A cushy university gig? She's not really the cable news type, but who knows. Whatever she does next, it won't be to the direct detriment of America's third-largest city.
This is a developing story and may be updated.
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