Brandon Johnson sworn in as Chicago mayor: ‘Our best and brightest days are ahead of us’

CHICAGO — Brandon Johnson commenced his mayoral term Monday with a rousing promise to propel the “soul of Chicago” to its greatest era yet, capping off the former commissioner and longtime labor organizer’s once-improbable rise to be the most progressive leader of the nation’s third-largest city in decades.

Johnson took the oath of office, administered by Cook County Chief Judge Timothy Evans, minutes before noon inside the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Credit Union 1 Arena, following a series of performances that included an African dance group stomping in tune to a steady drumbeat and a youth choral group crooning “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” known as the Black national anthem.

Johnson began his sweeping remarks by shouting out the greatness of Chicago: the “beauty” of Lake Michigan, its “boundary-breaking” arts and cultural scene and even the signature Italian beef. And, ever eager to reference his former profession as a social studies teacher, he shouted out the unique history of Black Chicago, starting from its founder, the Haitian voyager Jean Baptiste Point du Sable, before broadening to the city’s tapestry of immigrants who hail from all corners of the earth.

“There is something special about this city, and I call it the soul of Chicago,” Johnson said. “It was alive in the hearts of tens of thousands who arrived here in the Great Migration, including my grandparents, who came to Chicago in search of a home. ... It is the soul of Chicago that brought immigrants from all over the world to work, to organize, to build the first skyscraper.”

The new mayor’s speech struck an earnest tone with the humorous touches he was known for on the campaign trail.

While shouting out his large family and his late mother who always opened her door to relatives near and distant, he quipped, “I didn’t know how many cousins I had until I ran for mayor.” He amusedly remarked on his father’s profession as both a carpenter and pastor: “You understand the pressure of growing up in a house when your father is just like Jesus?”

After congratulating City Council members on their inauguration, Johnson turned to applaud the aldermen sitting on stage. The move was a clear contrast with his predecessor Lori Lightfoot’s inaugural address, where she spoke of the need for City Council to root out corruption then turned to force them to stand and applaud, a move that tainted her relationship with aldermen.

“We won’t always agree, but I won’t ever question your motives or your commitment,” Johnson told the council members. “And I’ll always do my part to find common ground.”

He acknowledged many of the challenges ahead while also offering hope for better days.

“Too many Chicagoans fear for their safety (when) they walk down the streets to get groceries or drive to the gas station. “... As we debate and discuss the solutions to these crises, I want to remind us that we have a real conversation. And that conversation is about the soul of Chicago. It’s alive. It’s alive and well in each and every one of us.”

To underscore the far reaches of the city’s violence, Johnson sought to draw a connection between the 2021 fatal Chicago police shooting of 13-year-old Adam Toledo and the recent slaying of police Officer Areanah Preston after she returned from a work shift, saying their respective parents grieve for them the same way.

“Thank you for sharing your extraordinary daughter with the city of Chicago,” he said to Preston’s family, to a standing ovation.

Johnson took pauses to embrace the weight of his journey to mayor, repeating the cheerful refrain from his victory speeches during the February election and the runoff night: “If you didn’t know, now you know.”

As his speech progressed, he nodded to campaign promises such as “Bring Chicago Home,” a measure to increase the real estate transfer tax on properties above $1 million to fund anti-homelessness initiatives, and the migrants who have made a new home in Chicago: “There’s enough room for everyone in the city of Chicago, whether you are seeking asylum or you are looking for a fully funded neighborhood.”

While acknowledging “many people who love our city deeply have radically different ideas about how to confront the shared challenges we face,” Johnson championed the might of labor, shouting out late Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, as he upheld the belief that his victory was a mandate to deliver social justice to Chicago, including through relief on the working class.

“You can’t stop someone on a payment plan from being a mayor of the city of Chicago,” he also interjected, a tongue-in-cheek reference to an eleventh-hour campaign flap in which his delinquent water bill became an issue.

Johnson’s special guests within the large and boisterous crowd included Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx, civil rights leader the Rev. Jesse Jackson, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten and many local labor leaders. Some in the crowd chanted, “CT Who? CTU,” a reference to the Chicago Teachers Union, as Johnson took his seat.

Prior to the swearing in, a person of Native American ancestry gave what’s called a land acknowledgment, noting the many Indigenous groups who called Chicago home before white settlers arrived, saying we must “dismantle settler colonialism here in Chicago.” Religious leaders ranging from the Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III, the Black pastor at Barack Obama’s former church, to a Jewish rabbi and Muslim imam also offered prayers.

Johnson is the city’s fourth Black mayor and, having turned 47 in March, one of its youngest mayors in recent decades. Richard M. Daley was almost exactly the same age when he took office on his 47th birthday in 1989.

With the final stage of the transition, Johnson’s winning campaign platform of uplifting the poor and delivering racial justice to a city beleaguered by a worldwide pandemic and civil unrest will officially be put to the test. His administration arrives as a confluence of issues still unfold in Chicago: its stubborn epidemic of gun violence, perennially strained city finances and a recent humanitarian crisis from the influx of migrants reaching a fever pitch.

The son of pastors who also were foster parents, Johnson grew up in northwest suburban Elgin with nine siblings and often tapped into his modest upbringing to explain his worldview of tackling pervasive trauma by “investing in people.”

The new mayor spoke of that childhood in his inaugural address.

“This is still very, very humbling for me. Because I have to tell you, growing up I never imagined I could be on a stage like this, “Johnson said. “Growing up one of 10 in a working-class family, it teaches you a lot about things, But I never could have foreseen that. Now make no mistake about it, that doesn’t mean that I’m not prepared.”

While naming the struggles of his brother Leon, who died while addicted to drugs, Johnson promised to reopen the mental health clinics shuttered under Mayor Rahm Emanuel and pass “Treatment Not Trauma,” a plan to send a nonpolice response to certain mental health crises.

The newly minted mayor closed his remarks by declaring Chicago’s history and future as a welcoming city to all, quoting from the Bible: “For our Scripture says, ‘I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.’ ... That has always been the soul of Chicago, and it will always be the soul of Chicago.”

“I say this today with a deep belief and conviction that our best and brighter days are ahead of us. We can lead Chicago to a new era together,” Johnson said. “We can build a better, stronger, safer Chicago. We just have to look deep into the soul of Chicago. Can I get a witness?”

The crowd roared in approval. Then a beaming Johnson banged the gavel, his first time as Chicago mayor.

It was a long way from when Johnson first rose in Chicago politics a decade ago as a CTU organizer before winning his first election to become Cook County commissioner in 2018.

Johnson lives in Austin, a West Side neighborhood regarded as one of the country’s most violent, and often notes the ubiquitious sound of gunshots on his block when explaining the personal stake he has in raising three children without the threat of gun violence.

Before the inauguration, Johnson made a series of stops in the West Side, including at Michele Clark high school where he was joined by officials including Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, state comptroller Susana Mendoza and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle. Clark students held signs hailing him as a member of the Eagles family, then he walked across the street to Leland Elementary School, where children greeted him with cheers.

Spotting one sign that said, “We believe in you,” Johnson pointed to the boy holding it and said, “I believe in you too!” He quipped that he wants at least two terms in response to a sign telling him “make this the best 4 years!”

The mayoral race saw Johnson and runoff opponent Paul Vallas frequently trade sharp barbs as their clashing ideologies battled for control of City Hall.

Johnson made a remarkable rise from polling in the single digits during the early months of his mayoral bid to knocking out Lightfoot in the initial round of voting — the first time a sitting Chicago mayor had lost reelection since Harold Washington beat Jane Byrne to become the city’s first Black mayor in 1983. He was buoyed by funds and a formidable ground game from the CTU and like-minded unions who have sought to win the fifth floor of City Hall for more than a decade but whose chosen candidates suffered mayoral runoff losses in 2015 and 2019.

Monday, as he took the reins from Lightfoot, he praised her historic milestone of serving as the city’s first Black woman and openly gay mayor.

At times on the campaign trail, Johnson stumbled over his past support of the “defund the police” movement to reallocate law enforcement budgets and send the funds to other social services in the wake of the 2020 Minneapolis police murder of George Floyd, as well as his close ties to the powerful CTU. But he overcame those weaknesses after arguing a holistic approach that includes reimagining the role of policing in Chicago, taxing the rich and directing massive investments toward education and other social services.

Johnson will imminently face the decision of who to pick as his permanent Chicago police superintendent while the department continues to struggle with a federal consent decree, in place in 2019 and on the heels of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation after a CPD officer murdered Laquan McDonald. He also faces the task of delivering his signature campaign pledges of promoting 200 detectives to chip away at lackluster homicide clearance rates and doubling youth employment.

In his first term, Johnson will oversee negotiations for the next contracts with the CTU and the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police, whose right-wing leader warned of “blood in the streets” should Johnson win and on Monday denounced Johnson’s line comparing the deaths of Toledo and Preston as “inexcusable, disgusting.”

But in addition to a strong alliance with CTU, Johnson comes into office with a host of existing, so-far positive relationships with political leaders such as Pritzker and Democratic Illinois statehouse leaders Senate President Don Harmon and House Speaker Emanuel “Chris” Welch.

Though Johnson ran as an unapologetic progressive, his appointments during the transition period signaled a mix of old- and new-guard faces that suggest he intends to tap into institutional knowledge despite the anti-establishment themes of his election. The breadth of backgrounds in his top staff members includes chief of staff pick Richard Guidice, a pragmatic City Hall veteran, and his deputy mayor for education, youth and human services, CTU’s most recent chief of staff, Jennifer “Jen” Johnson.

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