U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia will make a second run for Chicago mayor, posing potentially the biggest challenge yet for Mayor Lori Lightfoot as she seeks a second term.
Garcia’s candidacy had once been considered a longshot due to his comfortable seat in Congress and behind-the-scenes success as a political power broker. But Garcia, who has long dreamed of leading the nation’s third-largest city, decided to enter the mayor’s race in a risky move that could lead to him becoming Chicago’s first Latino mayor or mark him as a two-time loser.
Advertisement
Garcia released a video early Thursday — two days after winning another term in Congress — announcing his candidacy and noting the difficult recent years of economic instability, the pandemic and a racial reckoning.
“From crime to unemployment to affordable housing, there is so much uncertainty ahead … many live in fear of losing their homes, losing their livelihood, losing their loved ones,” he said.
Advertisement
Citing his decades-long ties to Little Village, he said he wants a “Chicago for everyone, the same city that welcomed me as a 9-year-old immigrant.”
He took a dig at Lightfoot without naming her, saying Chicago “needs a mayor that will bring us together and unite us instead of driving us apart.”
In 2015, Garcia pushed Mayor Rahm Emanuel into the city’s first runoff. Though he lost the campaign, Garcia became a progressive folk hero and jumped from the Cook County Board to the U.S. Congress in 2018 after Rep. Luis Gutierrez retired.
Garcia enters the race with high name recognition and a long record as a progressive, but he will need to expand his support beyond his traditional allies as some of the unions who supported his bid against Emanuel are backing Cook County commissioner Brandon Johnson.
The battle for progressive voters also represents a generational clash between Garcia, who was a Harold Washington ally in the 1980s, Johnson, and others in the race seeking the progressive mantle, including Ald. Sophia King and state Rep. Kambium Buckner.
Born in Durango, Mexico but raised in Chicago, Garcia was a young protege of Latino community activist Rudy Lozano, who was a budding political star. Garcia managed Lozano’s 1983 campaign for 22nd Ward alderman, where Lozano fell 37 votes short of ousting a veteran white incumbent at a time when Little Village was transforming into the center of Latino Chicago. Months later, Lozano was murdered by a gang member, a tragedy that also changed the trajectory of Chicago politics.
With Washington’s help, Garcia won election as 22nd Ward Democratic committeeman in 1984. He was elected alderman in a special election in 1986, which he held until running for a state senate seat in 1992. He was re-elected but lost a bid for a third term after being targeted for defeat by the Hispanic Democratic Organization, a political group allied with Daley.
Garcia then turned his attention to building a nonprofit community organizing group to press for voting rights, economic development issues, legal safeguards for immigrants without documents, violence prevention and other issues of concern to Latinos.
Advertisement
Now known as Enlace, the government-funded organization drew headlines in 2001 as it led a nearly three-week hunger strike by parents that pressured city school officials into fulfilling a long-delayed promise to build a new high school in Little Village.
Since winning a congressional seat in 2018, Garcia has grown his political power far beyond his Southwest Side base. The longtime progressive politician showed a practical side in recent years by building close ties with now-indicted former Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan, which helped expand Garcia’s influence, and his endorsement has been sought after by candidates all across the city.
Garcia considered running for mayor in 2019 after Emanuel bowed out of the race but he ultimately decided against a bid. Instead, Garcia helped Lightfoot become mayor that year by endorsing her in the runoff against Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, whose leadership team he served on while on the county board.
