A day before driving his oldest son to college, an emotional Brandon Johnson said Tuesday he would like to “hold on to this moment for a little while longer” — both as father and as Chicago’s mayor — before deciding whether to seek a second term.
Johnson said he allowed unnamed supporters to start circulating his nominating petitions Tuesday, the first day to start gathering the 12,500 signatures needed to get on the ballot. He said he was encouraged by the “number of individuals eager to continue the progress we’ve made.”
But he has not decided whether to forge ahead with a battle for reelection, or to walk away after a single term and avoid having voters potentially push him into political retirement.
“I’m kind of emotional today because my son is headed off tomorrow. I wish I could just hold on to him a little bit longer. There are parents across this country who have experienced it or will experience it. You just want to hold on to something a little bit longer because you know that once you let go, it will forever change,” the mayor said, his voice breaking.
“I just want to hold on to the city of Chicago a little bit longer just so that, when the politics come, we will have fully embraced the moment that we’re in.”
Chicago now has its lowest homicide rate in 60 years, and the city is gearing up to build more affordable housing.
“I want to hold on to that a little bit longer,” Johnson said. “Because you all know that once there’s an absolute decision that’s made, then it’s Chicago. … As much as I know I’m gonna have to let go of my son … at some point, I’m gonna have to let go and make a decision. But in the meantime, I have at least another 36 hours with my son.”
With only $631,309 in his campaign fund compared to nearly $22 million for Illinois Secretary of State Alexi Giannoulias, Johnson is leaning heavily on social media and the power of incumbency — along with the free media that comes with it. That strategy was on full display at Tuesday’s City Hall news conference.
For senior citizens affected by the Yellow Banana grocery store closings, Johnson announced that a $25,000 grant from Lyft would offer seniors free round-trip rides to grocery stores.
The city, which invested $13 million in the now-shuttered Yellow Banana stores, continues to explore “additional pathways to improve food security, including public markets and other innovative models that expand access to fresh, affordable food while creating opportunities for local entrepreneurs,” Johnson said.
The mayor also announced 2,000 “additional paid summer job opportunities” for young people “during these critical final weeks,” along with preapprenticeship skills training and job placement services for 1,500 young adults between the ages of 18 and 24.
Before driving his son to Eastern Illinois University to begin his first year, Johnson reflected on the $639.6 million migrant crisis he inherited, the difficult choices that it forced him to make, and the political price he paid for those decisions reigniting an us-versus-them conflict between Blacks and Hispanics.
“I understand the frustration that Black people felt during that mission.” I do. I do,” Johnson said, pausing to gather himself. “Here’s what I understand: We don’t ask for much. We don’t. We just don’t want our schools to close. We want opportunities for paid jobs. … For Black Chicago in particular, it kind of felt [like] government was able to turn on resources in a moment’s notice — and our communities have been starved for decades.”
Johnson said he “made a commitment to respond to the most vulnerable” and delivered by moving 3,000 migrants off the floors of Chicago’s district police stations.
“I tried desperately to live in my values, even though it cost me politically. It did cost me,” he said, accusing the media of misreporting city spending without acknowledging that state funding used to put migrants in hotels was withdrawn when it “got too expensive.”
Sources said Johnson’s own polling shows his public approval rating among Black voters plunging to 28% in early 2024. It now stands somewhere between 48% and 52% in those same polls.
Johnson said there is “no perfect model” for how to “govern as a progressive in the midst of decades of malfeasance and neglect.”
He added it’s “too soon to prognosticate what the future will hold, but what I can say is that building a safe and affordable city in America is the joy of my experience in this moment.”