As Greg Hinz notes at Crain’s Chicago Business, things are unfolding exactly as I have predicted:
Remap at best is a contentious and nasty process, a zero-sum game in which someone wins and someone else loses But add race and ethnicity into it—and a little bit of Chicago-style hardball politics—and the potential for some real nastiness is apparent.
That’s one of the clearest conclusions to be drawn from the U.S. census figures released yesterday, results that confirmed Latinos in Chicago now outnumber Blacks.
The figures have been expected, at least in general terms. African-Americans continue to move out of the city, with their population now down nearly 85,000 over the past decade, to 788,000. Meanwhile both the Latino and Asian populations continued a steady uptick, hitting 820,000 and 190,000, respectively, with the white population increasing just a bit to 864,000.
What arguably wasn’t expected was the vehemence with which Latino political leaders have seized on the now-official figures to demand increased representation in the City Council—representation that, as my colleague A.D. Quig reported last month, likely will result in fewer wards dominated by Blacks.
“Latinos suffer from a disproportionate underrepresentation in city leadership that has real-life consequences,†City Council Latino Caucus head Ald. Gil Villegas, 36th, wrote in a guest column in the Chicago Tribune today. Be it street violence or the impact of COVID, “Chicagoan have the right to elect people who can change these realities because they understand them,†Villegas wrote.
On the other side of the coin not all Hispanics are eligible to vote, they aren’t registered to vote as greatly as blacks, and even when registered don’t show up to the polls as regularly as blacks do. In the final analysis demographics don’t matter. What matters is who shows up at the polls. 90% of life is showing up.
Let’s see if the next part of my prediction holds true: the infighting between blacks and Hispanics will redound to the benefit of whites.
No, blacks and Hispanics will fight among themselves, but they will present aunited front against Whites.