The Rundown | 4/5
Proviso's commissioner becomes Chicago's mayor, solidifying the Greater West Side's political clout; the scramble's now on for Johnson's successor on the county board
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Proviso’s commissioner elected Chicago’s mayor
Chicago Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson at a campaign stop on April 1. | Paul Goyette
On Tuesday, 1st District Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson was elected mayor of Chicago. According to the preliminary vote count, Johnson beat former Chicago Public Schools CEO Paul Vallas 51% to 49%. Click here for updated counts.
With his win, Johnson, a resident of Chicago’s Austin community — right next door to the west suburbs — becomes the city’s first West Side mayor in, well, maybe ever? Johnson also becomes the first Chicago mayor about whom many people in Oak Park and Proviso Township can legitimately say: ‘I knew you back when …’
As commissioner for the 1st District, Johnson has been rather ubiquitous across the west suburbs (at ribbon-cuttings, banquets, parades, church services, etc.). The former Chicago Public Schools (CPS) teacher and Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) organizer rose to prominence in 2018, when he upset incumbent 1st District Commissioner Richard Boykin in a Democratic Primary race perhaps even closer than last night’s. Johnson easily won the general election against Libertarian James Humay.
What’s interesting is that if Boykin had not made an archenemy out of powerful Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle (Boykin loudly opposed her tax on sugary beverages), she may not have been as stridently against Boykin’s reelection campaign and Johnson may not have won that close primary race (Preckwinkle, a former teacher herself, endorsed Johnson in the 2018 primary and likely relished Boykin’s defeat).
Preckwinkle lost her tense 2019 bid for mayor to Lori Lightfoot in a landslide and the two feuded beyond the election, straining the governing relationship between the county and city. I’ve been told by Johnson’s people that Preckwinkle, who endorsed Johnson over Vallas, has stated that a working relationship with the former union organizer would be a welcome reprieve from her tense relationship with Lightfoot. Indeed, Preckwinkle may have relished her rival’s failure to make the runoff.
Another striking similarity between Johnson’s successful 2018 Democratic primary bid for commissioner and his successful bid for mayor is that Johnson savvily framed his opponent, another moderate Democrat, as a closeted Republican. Below is from a 2017 article I wrote on the future mayor’s county board campaign:
[Johnson] offered a caustic description of Boykin’s first term in the commissioner’s seat, alleging the commissioner, an attorney by trade, has aligned himself with the Republican Party.
“Unfortunately, what you’re hearing from Richard is about cuts, closures, consolidations and efficiencies,” Johnson said. “He’s going after working-class people. Those are the talking points of the Republican Party.”
Vallas — a paid school privatizer who in 2009, the year after Barack Obama was elected president, was on video saying he’d “probably register as a Republican in the next primary” — was a much easier target than Boykin.
With his win Tuesday, Johnson becomes the latest in a rich lineage of savvy local and statewide political heavyweights who have roots in the west suburbs (namely Proviso Township — Maywood, really — and Oak Park), including former Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn (a Fenwick grad who got his start in politics in Oak Park), Illinois House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch (a Hillside resident raised in Maywood and Bellwood), Illinois Senate President Don Harmon (a lifelong Oak Parker), Illinois Senate Majority Leader Kimberly Lightford (who lives in Maywood), and Cook County Clerk Karen Yarbrough (who is also a Maywood resident).
If you go back even further, there’s the late former Illinois Senate President Phil Rock (Oak Park), the late former Cook County Recorder of Deeds Eugene “Gene” Moore (Maywood), and former Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez (River Forest), among others.
The scramble for Johnson’s commission seat begins
Once he becomes sworn in as mayor, Commissioner Johnson will give up his seat on the county board, possibly prompting a mad rush among political ladder-climbers. And there are many in Proviso — from suburban mayors and trustees to organizers and activists — who are too numerous to name.
This sort of transition has happened in the recent past. When 2nd District Commissioner Robert Steele died in June 2017, a committee was formed that was led by a Chicago alderman. That committee — “made up of all the Democratic ward committeemen within the county's 2nd District,” DNA Info reported at the time — vetted 13 people who applied to fill Steele’s vacant seat before ultimately selecting West Side businessman Dennis Deer.
And when 16 District Commissioner Jeffrey Tobolski resigned in 2020, Democratic committeemen representing Tobolski’s district met in Berwyn to choose his successor, former Republican state representative Frank Aguilar, who is still 16th District commissioner.