Mayor Brandon Johnson says he should have “cleaned house faster” when he took office, and now plans to correct that mistake by sending people packing.
“If you ain’t with us, you just gotta go,” the mayor said.
Johnson ominous warning that heads are about to roll before the midpoint of his term came during an appearance Monday night at New Covenant Missionary Baptist Church, 754 E. 77th St. It was the first in a series of appearances Johnson is calling his “Faith in Government” initiative.
Seated onstage with Pastor Stephen Thurston, Johnson was essentially asked to Monday-morning-quarterback his own performance.
“If there was something I could change or do differently or just reset, I would have cleaned house faster,” Johnson said.
After a long pause, Johnson harkened back to his religious background as a preacher’s son.
“I was raised a certain way. I’m just being honest. And there were a number of people that I inherited in my administration. And I was trying to show God-ly presentation that we can work with people who come from other administrations. … They don’t have to agree with me 100% to work within my administration,” the mayor said.
“Yeah, I wouldn’t have done that. If you ain’t with us, you just gotta go. So now I’m in a position now where I’ll be making some decisions in the days to come because playing nice with other people who ain’t about us — it’s just a waste of exercise.”
Johnson: ‘Stay tuned’ to see who gets fired
The church audience seemed stunned by the mayor’s candor. Several people could be heard saying, “Oooh” and “Wow.”
“So there’s a whole bunch of people saying, `Oh, shoot. Who’s about to get fired?’” Johnson added. “Well, you about to find out. Stay tuned.”
The mayor’s office would not elaborate Tuesday on what Johnson meant. But speculation about whose days might be numbered centers around three holdovers from former Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration, and its deputies and top aides: Chicago Park District Superintendent Rosa Escareno, Aviation Commissioner Jamie Rhee and Transportation Commissioner Tom Carney, recently elevated by Johnson.
Other Lightfoot and Rahm Emanuel appointees who might be vulnerable include City Colleges Chancellor Juan Salgado and Fire Commissioner Annette Holt.
Johnson retained CTA President Dorval Carter Jr. until recently, even after a majority of City Council members demanded Carter’s ouster amid persistent complaints about service, security and cleanliness. Last month, Carter announced his retirement.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Chicago Transit Authority President Dorval Carter with the full funding grant agreement for the Red Line Extension Project at an event in Pullman in January. Many believe that Carter’s ability to lock in federal funding for the extension was a key reason Carter remained in that job after Johnson was elected.
Pat Nabong/Sun-Times
The mayor’s early decision to retain Chicago Public Schools CEO Pedro Martinez has culminated in a messy divorce that landed in court.
Some personnel changes the mayor did make ended up backfiring — like the decision to replace popular Cultural Affairs Commissioner Erin Harkey with Clinee Hedspeth, who served as Johnson’s legislative director during his days as Cook County commissioner.
Chief of staff left amid staff clashes
Rich Guidice, a City Hall lifer, spent nearly eleven months as Johnson’s chief of staff. Guidice argued it wasn’t a mistake for Johnson to allow members of the previous administration to stay on. Rather, it was a political “necessity” for an inexperienced politician who had never before held executive office and had not assembled his own team.
“My role was to stabilize government and keep the wheels turning … until he would be able to do that himself,” Guidice told the Sun-Times on Tuesday.
“They didn’t have a bench to put people in a lot of the places they originally wanted to have people … Even if he wanted to get rid of people, you couldn’t because there’s nobody qualified to put in those spots. They were probably unaware of a lot of the challenges they were going to be up against if you do want to replace a commissioner or even a deputy in certain places.”
Johnson’s appointment of Guidice sent a reassuring message to the business community and everyone else who was worried what Chicago’s most progressive mayor ever might do.
Picking Guidice meant a savvy and seasoned veteran who knew city government like the back of his hand would be steering the ship through transition waters. The fact that police officers and firefighters — among those most leery of Johnson — knew and trusted Guidice from his tenure as executive director of the Office of Emergency Management and Communications was a plus.
They assumed Guidice, who had seen Chicago through countless special events, would guide the new mayor through the Democratic National Convention and the protests that went with it.
He ended up leaving the Johnson administration five months before the DNC, after less than a year on the job, amid behind-the-scenes clashes with some of the more progressive members of Johnson’s inner circle.
Guidice said Tuesday he has “no idea” what Johnson means by “If you ain’t with us, you just gotta go.”
“There’s a small group of people that probably share his views. And I don’t know how he would be able to replace government with people with those views and keep the wheels turning on the day-to-day functions of the city,” Guidice said.
Lack of management experience mattered
Veteran Democratic political consultant Peter Giangreco agreed Johnson’s consistent 14% public approval rating has nothing to do with his failure to clean house at City Hall.
It’s simply “an admission” that Johnson “wasn’t ready to run things” and “hadn’t thought through how to staff up to actually make a city work,” he said.
“It’s a lot easier to run a campaign than to govern. And the current mayor has made it clear from Day One — and he reiterated [Monday] night — that he wasn’t ready to do this job,” said Giangreco, who advised Illinois Comptroller Susana Mendoza during her unsuccessful 2019 mayoral campaign.
“If you have prior management experience, you have people you know you can trust who can get things done. You already have them before you come in. … Chicago elected a person who had little or no management experience. … You can rearrange the deck chairs now. But I don’t think it changes much.”
Ald. Carlos Ramirez-Rosa (35th), Johnson’s former Council floor leader, wouldn’t comment on rampant speculation he might be in line to replace Escareno as Park District superintendent.
But Ramirez-Rosa said he understands the mayor’s seemingly belated desire to surround himself with people he can trust.
“Every mayor or any executive that comes in obviously wants to bring in people [who] align with their vision and that are loyal — that aren’t going to leak things, that aren’t going to seek to undermine the policies they were brought in to implement,” Ramirez-Rosa said.