Take It From A City That Knows: Rahm Emanuel Is Bad For America

CHICAGO — When asked about news that a virus-like threat could infect President-elect Joe Biden's administration, Mayor Lori Lightfoot wore a pained expression on her face.

"I don't have any opinion about that," she said.

By "that," Lightfoot was referring to reports that Biden might offer a spot on his Cabinet to Rahm Emanuel, her mayoral predecessor whose administration orchestrated what a lot of Chicagoans call the cover-up of Laquan McDonald's murder.

I don't understand why Lightfoot claimed neutrality. Emanuel's abysmal failure as Chicago's mayor inspired Lightfoot to quit her City Hall appointment to announce plans to run against him.

Maybe Lightfoot held back because she didn't want to openly embarrass the president-elect's transition team insiders who floated the idea of appointing Emanuel as U.S. secretary of transportation to The New York Times by telling the whole truth: Biden would be better off without Rahm's political baggage.

And Rahm's got a lot.

It's no secret Emanuel was co-architect of the "three strikes" crime bill that led to the mass incarceration of African Americans — which Biden has called a "mistake" he regrets backing as a U.S. senator. In 1996, Emanuel advised former President Bill Clinton to "claim and achieve record deportations of criminal aliens." He was the architect of the North American Free Trade Agreement that sent American jobs across borders, and so-called welfare reform that only made extreme poverty worse.

But, let's face it, that's old news on a long list of reasons there should be a ban on appointing Emanuel to any job that gives him a say in public policy.

It's the state in which Emanuel left Chicago that is the most troubling part of his legacy, and a harbinger for the damage he can do when entrusted with power. His administration treated Chicago as if it were two cities — one for the rich and powerful, another for the poor and forgotten.

Chicagoans remember how often Emanuel bragged of attracting an always increasing number of tourists from around the world, while turning a blind eye to the exodus of Black families fleeing neighborhoods neglected by City Hall.

As mayor, Emanuel closed the most public schools in American history and shut down half of the city's mental health centers, most of them in poor and minority neighborhoods.

Emanuel catered to the rich and famous. His administration squandered millions of dollars in federal funding pushing Elon Musk's high-speed train tunnel to O'Hare International Airport that died before the digging started. He funneled billions of taxpayer dollars skimmed from public schools and the park district to developers building the rich part of town.

And Emanuel would have given away a corner of Chicago's precious lakefront land — and millions more taxpayer money — for "Star Wars" creator George Lucas' private museum, if a righteous lawsuit didn't stop him.

During Emanuel's tenure, he hit homeowners with the biggest property tax increase in our city's history, raised fines and fees that hurt poor folks the most, and made the city's bad deals with money-grubbing parking meter and red-light camera companies worse.

And let's not overlook Emanuel's lacking judgment on who was best to lead Chicago's efforts on everything from improving schools and reforming the police department to managing public housing.

His hand-picked public schools chief, Barbara Byrd-Bennett, went to federal prison for pocketing.

The guy Emanuel promised would restore trust in the Chicago Police Department, former Superintendent Eddie Johnson, only made matters worse. He got fired for lying to Mayor Lightfoot about the night cops found him passed out behind the wheel after a boozy night of kissy-face with an officer — who wasn't his wife and who recently filed a lawsuit accusing him of years of sexual assault.

Emanuel's choice to lead the Chicago Housing Authority board, John Hooker, has since been implicated (but not charged) in a bribery scheme in which, according to a federal deferred-prosecution agreement, ComEd dolled out jobs and money to win legislative favors from Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan.

Emanuel's pick to run the Chicago Board of Education, Frank Clark — ComEd's chief executive when the feds say the bribery scheme began — was named in a federal subpoena served on Madigan. And the FBI is currently investigating a dirty $1 billion custodial contract approved when Clark was board of education boss.

If Biden is being honest about his plans to be an American president who brings people together, the post-Rahm state of Chicago should be all the proof the president-elect needs to know that Emanuel isn't the guy for any job.

Rahm left our city more starkly divided by class and race than he found it.

Besides, America deserves better leaders than a failed mayor whose top City Hall lawyer brokered a deal with a poor mother — $5 million to keep secret a video showing a Chicago cop fire every bullet in his gun, 16 shots, until her Black teenage son was dead — that saved his re-election bid.

Take it from a city that knows.

Mark Konkol, recipient of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting, wrote and produced the Peabody Award-winning series, "Time: The Kalief Browder Story." He was a producer, writer and narrator for the "Chicagoland" docu-series on CNN, and a consulting producer on the Showtime documentary, "16 Shots."

More from Mark Konkol:

• Why Did Pritzker Party In A Crowd Despite His Coronavirus Advice?

• Gov. Pritzker Has Nobody But Himself To Blame For 'Fair Tax' Fail

• Pritzker's Political Winter Coming After Voters Reject 'Fair Tax'

• If Voting Results Throw You In Pit Of Despair, Be Like Pastor Bob

• 'No One Right Way' To Fight Virus, But Is Pritzker's Way Best?

This article originally appeared on the Chicago Patch