By Hermene D. Hartman
The historic mayoral election is over, the voting is complete, and the people have spoken. Mayor Rahm Emanuel was punished for closing the schools and ignoring the neighborhoods. Jesus "Chuy" Garcia was heard and stands to become the first Hispanic mayor of Chicago. National money will come to the table for him as it did when people realized that Harold Washington could seriously become the first Black mayor of Chicago in 1983.
Willie Wilson has positioned himself as the power broker as the political novice amazingly got 10 percent of the vote, which was more of an anti-Rahm vote than it was a pro-Willie Wilson vote. The winner of the election, once again, was Mr. Apathy. Nearly 70 percent of the eligible voting population did not go to the polls, rendering yet another historically low voter turnout.
However, enough people rallied to force a run-off not only for mayor, but for many of Rahm's aldermanic minions. The election on April 7 is Rahm's to lose and Garcia's to win. The polls missed it. There was a real "Anybody-But-Rahm" movement at work here and President Obama's visit didn't matter at the last minute. People were not impressed with "the hug."
The timing of the ceremony naming the Pullman District a National Park was clumsy at best as it eliminated the real players, including mayoral candidate Robert Fioretti, who grew up in the Roseland/Pullman neighborhood and went to college on a Pullman Scholarship. This is the second Chicago area election in a row when the Obama imperial presence did not provide a win. The first was the gubernatorial election in November of last year, when the president's appearance on behalf of incumbent Pat Quinn was not enough to keep him in office.
Many people are disappointed with the President and his popularity does not translate into votes, not only in Chicago and Illinois, but in cities and states across the nation, where some Democratic candidates prefer that he not even show up to support them. In the meantime, Rahm's campaign coiffeurs had $14 million, which translates to $66 per vote. Chuy had only a million dollars and got to TV late in the game. The spend ratio was 12 to 1 between Rahm and Garcia.
The story here is that money does not necessarily win the race when the narrative to the people still has the broader appeal. But realize, however, that Mayor Rahm Emanuel carried every single Black ward, even as some alderman dropped him from their palm cards for fear of losing their own elections.
