Chicago Lands 2024 Democratic Convention

Gregory Korte and Shruti Date Singh
Updated ·5 min read
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(Bloomberg) -- Democrats will hold their 2024 national convention in Chicago, a decision highlighting recent progressive victories in the city and in the larger Midwest, a region crucial to President Joe Biden’s reelection prospects.

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The convention will be held August 19-22, 2024, the Democratic National Committee announced on Tuesday.

The DNC noted that Chicago sits amid the “blue wall” of industrial Midwestern states that have swung the past two presidential elections. “The Midwest reflects America and will give Democrats an opportunity to showcase some of President Biden and Vice President Harris’s most significant accomplishments for American families,” DNC Chairman Jaime Harrison said in a statement.

In choosing Chicago, the party passed over competing bids from Atlanta and New York in a process that saw all three cities argue that they best exemplified Democrats’ political future. The decision ultimately fell to Biden as party leader, and puts him one step closer to formally announcing his reelection campaign.

The decision follows two elections that buoyed progressive Democrats in the region.

Last week, Chicago voters elected as mayor 47-year-old Cook County commissioner Brandon Johnson, the more progressive of two Democratic candidates in a non-partisan runoff election. Johnson campaigned on increased spending on social services to combat the root causes of crime, funded by higher taxes on aviation fuel, real estate transfers and financial transactions.

And in Wisconsin, Democrats flipped the state Supreme Court, winning a majority for the first time in 15 years with the victory of Janet Protasiewicz, an election that highlighted how the party is using the issue of abortion rights to draw voters to the polls following the 2022 midterms.

Winning Bid

Chicago boasted a combination of union support, fundraising ability and logistics. As the presumptive nominee, Biden will address his party in the 960,000-square-foot United Center, the largest arena in the US.

Chicago’s selection comes at a time when the city is at a crossroads. Not only is the third-largest US city in the midst of a mayoral transition but it is still trying to recover from decades-old problems exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic. The region’s unemployment rate is higher than the national average with the next recession already on the horizon, and the reputation of its business climate has taken a hit with the loss of high-profile headquarters for Boeing Co. and billionaire Ken Griffin’s Citadel.

Illinois Governor J.B. Pritzker has said a convention would infuse more than $150 million into the region’s economy and draw visitors to its museums and theaters, lakefront, sports teams and restaurants. The city, which counts tourism and conventions among key industries, would benefit as it tries to balance its budget next year with revenue potentially dropping amid a recession.

Pritzker was left the job of selling Chicago for the convention site as outgoing Mayor Lori Lightfoot grappled with political problems.

The venture capitalist-turned-governor all but guaranteed the party that Chicago’s business community would be able to raise the full cost of a convention — estimated at more than $70 million — without saddling the party with debt. Pritzker’s own wealth is estimated at $3.7 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

Among the other supporters of the Chicago bid were Penny Pritzker, the governor’s sister and chairwoman of PSP Capital Partners, Grosvenor Capital Management’s Michael Sacks and Chicago Cubs co-owner Laura Ricketts.

The governor pressed his case to the president personally, using a ride in the presidential limousine in Chicago last year to lobby for the convention.

“I’m thrilled Chicago has been selected to host the #2024DNC!,” Pritzker wrote Tuesday in a tweet from his political — not gubernatorial — account. “I look forward to welcoming everyone to the Midwest & showing off our diverse communities, impeccable hospitality, and world-renowned venues. There is no better place to tell the story of @JoeBiden & @KamalaHarris.”

The second-term governor has deflected an interest in running for president in 2024 and hasn’t ruled out a run in 2028. And a convention on his home turf would all but guarantee him a prime-time speaking slot, a traditional launching pad for rising stars in the party.

Unlike Atlanta, Chicago isn’t in a battleground state. But the bid had the support of Democrats across the industrial Midwest, including the “Blue Wall” states considered essential to a Democratic victory. The Chicago media market stretches into Wisconsin, which former President Donald Trump won in 2016 and which Biden reclaimed in 2020 by just 20,682 votes.

Republicans will hold their convention next year 100 miles north of Chicago in Milwaukee, the same city where Democrats held a skeleton convention during the 2020 pandemic. Many of the innovations from that convention — like a virtual roll call of the states and more pre-packaged videos — are likely to return in 2024, party officials say.

Obama Legacy

As a long-time one-party town, Chicago has deep resonance in Democratic party politics. Former President Barack Obama used the city as a springboard from community activist to state legislator to senator to the presidency.

In choosing Chicago, Biden will likely invite comparisons to his former running mate and highlight what he hopes will be two decades of Democratic control of the White House interrupted only by four years of Trump.

Chicago last hosted Democrats in 1996, when President Bill Clinton accepted the party’s nomination for a second term, which he won in an electoral vote landslide.

But it also hosted the disastrous 1968 convention, when anti-war and civil rights protests overshadowed the nomination and helped to derail Hubert Humphrey’s candidacy.

(Updates with details on economic impact in paragraphs 9-10)

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