News analysis

Following his upset win last month, Brandon Johnson, a progressive Democrat, will be sworn in as the 57th mayor of Chicago on May 15 and be faced with increasing crime and below-par public education trends—and it will only get worse, according to experts who spoke with The Epoch Times.

Johnson, 47, defeated Paul Vallas, a 69-year-old moderate Democrat, in the April 4 runoff. Johnson will succeed Democrat Lori Lightfoot, who lost in the Feb. 28 primary following years of coming under fire on issues ranging from COVID-19 to public safety. Johnson has been on the Cook County Board of Commissioners.

Cook County is where Chicago is located.

“When Brandon Johnson takes over as mayor, Chicago’s ills will intensify and exacerbate the city’s experience with the urban doom loop,” Jordan McGillis, a Paulson Policy Analyst at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, told The Epoch Times.

“While Lori Lightfoot is seen on the right as a progressive, there’s a strong contrast between Johnson’s tenor and Lightfoot’s on Chicago’s biggest problems, crime, and educational quality,” he continued.

Indeed, one of the biggest issues in the election was public safety.

As of April 23, according to the Chicago Police Department, overall violent crime has increased by 45 percent.

Murders are down 9 percent from 2022, sexual assaults are up by 3 percent, and robberies have increased by 14 percent.

Aggravated batteries are up 7 percent, burglaries have increased by 6 percent, and thefts are up 23 percent.

Most alarmingly, motor vehicle thefts have increased by 135 percent.

Johnson came under fire from Vallas and other critics for advocating for defunding the police. Johnson sought to walk it back ahead of the runoff. Nonetheless, experts told The Epoch Times to expect public safety to go downhill on Johnson’s watch.

“On crime and public disorder, Johnson takes a deeply conciliatory tone, whereas Lightfoot maintains that some accountability must be held,” said McGillis.

“Johnson’s administration has already made it clear that it will preserve many of the unproductive policies administered by Lightfoot, including handcuffing the Chicago Police Department, maintaining Chicago as a ‘sanctuary city,’ emboldening criminals, and excessively taxing and regulating what remains of Chicago’s once-thriving local businesses,” said Chris Talgo, an editor and writer at The Heartland Institute, a free-market think tank.

“In many ways, Johnson’s administration could be much worse than Lightfoot’s. To date, Johnson has alluded that he will further drain Chicago’s already beleaguered police budget,” he added.

Johnson had been a supporter of the “Defund the Police” movement, which he in 2020 called an “actual, real political goal.” Johnson has since sought to distance himself from that cause.

Johnson told Laura Washington, a political analyst for ABC’s Chicago affiliate, at a forum in March that he “said it was a political goal. I never said it was mine.

“As far as my vision for public safety, I’m not going to defund the police,” he said.

Nonetheless, according to experts, Johnson’s past support for defunding law enforcement is a cause for concern.

“It’s clear he believes that less policing is good for our community when, in fact, just the opposite is true,” Zack Smith, a legal fellow and manager of the Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Program at the conservative Heritage Foundation’s Meese Center, told The Epoch Times.

“We know what works to reduce crime. Putting more police on the streets, empowering them to do their jobs in a professional and responsible manner, and making sure criminals get prosecuted,” he continued. “None of those things seem to be a priority.”

Smith noted that Johnson would be working with Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, who has come under fire—since she came into office on Dec. 1, 2016—from critics who say she is soft on crime.

“Based on her policies, I think it’s clear her tenure as district attorney has been a failed tenure,” he said.

Foxx’s tenure has been so turbulent that a veteran prosecutor, Jason Poje, quit with a blistering May 5 letter to colleagues that blasted Foxx.

Smith remarked, “What happens with the police department isn’t really going to matter if you have a rogue district attorney or a rogue state’s attorney in office who’s not going to prosecute crime.”

Illinois abolished cash bail, though the change that was scheduled to take effect this past New Year’s Day has been put on hold by the state’s supreme court.

“Because at the end of the day, criminals, for all their flaws, they’re not stupid,” said Smith. “They realize that even if they get arrested, they’re probably not going to be held without bail. They’re probably going to be released back onto the street, and then the district attorney or the state’s attorney there isn’t going to prosecute them.”

Criminals, said Smith, “understand the message that’s being sent. And so it’s really going to be the city, making sure they have adequate funding and staffing for their police, and getting a state’s attorney in there who’s going to actually prosecute crimes.”

Foxx recently announced she will not run for reelection in 2024. This could provide Chicagoans an opportunity to put in someone who can serve as a bulwark to Johnson’s public safety agenda.

“It would certainly help,” said Smith, who added that when Chicago police bring the state’s attorney’s office “a case to prosecute, it’s important that they follow through and actually prosecute assuming there’s the evidence.

“It would certainly be, if you have a prosecutor who is committed to upholding the law, to doing their jobs, to seeking justice for victims and holding criminals, particularly violent criminals, accountable, that would be a significant improvement over the current situation in Cook County in the city of Chicago,” said Smith.

Another major issue in Chicago is education.

Chicago’s high school graduation rate is 78.4 percent, as students have struggled to demonstrate proficiency in mathematics and reading.

At the elementary school level, the test score proficiency in math is 21 percent, and 25 percent in reading.

At the middle school level, the test score proficiency in math is 21 percent, and 24 percent in reading.

At the high school level, the test score proficiency in math is 23 percent, and 21 percent in reading.

As McGillis noted, “Johnson tacked much further to the left in this election campaign than Lightfoot ever did, garnering the backing of the powerful teachers union, of which Lightfoot was at times critical during her tenure.”

“Johnson has also made it clear that he intends to reward Chicago’s failing public school system, which is not that big of a surprise considering Johnson’s campaign was almost exclusively funded by the Chicago Teachers Union,” said Talgo.

Another issue facing the Windy City is the surge in migrants illegally crossing the southern border.

On May 3, Johnson decried governors who have been sending illegal immigrants to Democrat-led cities, including Chicago, which he has pledged to maintain as a sanctuary city for illegal aliens.

“We have, you know, governors at the border that have demonstrated that they are not willing to collaborate in a real way, and so that is, of course, very disappointing,” he said at a press conference introducing the incoming interim chief of the Chicago Police Department.

Johnson went on to say that he is “prepared to have conversations with everyone, in particular, those who may use this as a weapon against cities.”

He accused the governors of using the illegal immigrants as a “political football,” something he called “unconscionable.”

Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who represent a state at the crux of the migrant crisis, fired back at Johnson.

“I would ask the question, ‘What are the governors of border states like Texas supposed to do and these border communities that are being overwhelmed?'” Cornyn told The Epoch Times.

“I think [Texas] Gov. [Greg] Abbott and Gov. [Ron] DeSantis and others who have bussed migrants and basically facilitated their travel to some of these cities like New York, Washington, and Chicago, they’ve done so in desperation, trying to gain the president’s attention, thinking, ‘Well, he won’t listen to Republicans. Maybe he’ll listen to Democrats, and maybe he’ll listen to these mayors of large cities,'” he continued.

Cruz called Johnson a hypocrite.

“There’s no shortage of hypocritical Democratic mayors who are perfectly happy for America to have open borders and to have 6 million people cross illegally, the vast majority of whom crossed into the state of Texas and to say, ‘It’s not my problem,'” he said.

“And yet when the illegal immigrants arrive to their city, they hysterically and hypocritically declare an emergency,” he continued. “It is an emergency. It is a crisis. But it’s a crisis caused by Democrats deliberately.”

Cruz ridiculed Democrats, including Johnson, for shedding “crocodile tears.”

Cruz offered a remedy to Democrat mayors, whose circle Johnson will soon join: Tell President Joe Biden to put a stop to the influx of illegal aliens.

“For every Democrat mayor who screams and howlers when illegal immigrants arrive in their cities, they have an easy solution: Pick up the phone and call the White House. Joe Biden could solve this problem today,” he said. “He doesn’t want to.”

Finally, Johnson wants to raise $800 million in new taxes, though not property taxes, which are already high in Chicago.

“On fiscal matters, again, Johnson is further to the left,” said McGillis. “All of these factors are going to further incentivize departures from the city of businesses and people with wealth.”

Businesses that left Chicago during Lightfoot’s tenure have included Aldi, Caterpillar, Citadel, Tyson Foods, and Boeing.

The Epoch Times has reached out to Johnson’s camp to get their reaction to their critics.

At the end of the day, Chicagoans wanted the same policies—just not the same person implementing them.

“Unfortunately, the voters of Chicago sent a clear message that they want more of the same,” said Talgo. “On one hand, Chicagoans constantly complain about the decline of the city, particularly the high cost of living, rampant crime, homelessness, and degradation of city services. However, instead of going in a different direction and electing Paul Vallas, Chicagoans are doubling-down on radical leftist policies, which have turned the city into a national laughingstock.”

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.