LETTER FROM WASHINGTON
The humiliation is spectacular. Lori Lightfoot, the outgoing mayor of Chicago (Illinois), will not appear in the second round of the municipal election on April 4. Eliminated from the race, she will let two other Democrats compete for her seat.
The reasons for this stampede in the third city of the United States are numerous. The first, by far, is crime. This theme dominated the campaign, putting Lori Lightfoot on the defensive. The exasperation of the population seems general and is no longer confined to the neighborhoods usually affected by this insecurity. The local police chief, the “superintendent” David Brown, has also announced his resignation in the wake of the first round. Crimes have increased by 33% in the city in total since 2019. Meanwhile, the number of police officers has decreased, due to a wave of uncompensated retirements.
This defeat of Lori Lighfoot is “a warning signal for the country”commented on March 5 the mayor of New York, Democrat Eric Adams, who built his own electoral success on the fight against crime.
This has become the major contentious issue in major Democratic-dominated American cities, especially on both coasts. The urban riots after the death of George Floyd at the hands of the police in May 2020 in Minneapolis (Minnesota), as well as the pandemic, which led to a sharp rise in insecurity, have deeply marked public opinion. Two demands coincide, without necessarily meeting: better supervision of police interventions, to limit abuse and violence, and a more effective fight against everyday crime and drug trafficking.
“Any effort to overturn laws democratically passed by the District of Columbia degrades the rights of its residents and elected officials to self-govern” – Brian Schwalb, DC Attorney General
Crime statistics increased in 2021 and 2022, particularly in terms of shoplifting and carjackings. But murders were down slightly last year, according to estimates. A total of 44,000 people died by firearms in 2022, suicides in almost half of the cases.
Never mind, for conservative channels like Fox News, which present these cities as concrete jungles given over to savagery, lawless zones thriving thanks to the supposed laxity of liberal mayors. These same media, however, refuse to consider questioning the free sale of weapons of war, twenty million of which are in circulation in the United States. The White House would like to raise the minimum age of acquisition to 21 years old but comes up against Republican refusal in Congress.
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