The editors of the Chicago Tribune are talking about political machines, too:
Lori Lightfoot, who was cast out of office Tuesday night, was no machine politician. In fact, her future biographer likely will declare her to be, or have been, about as far from a machine politician as it is possible to travel. But when it came to Brandon Johnson, one of the candidates who won a spot in the runoff with Paul Vallas to succeed her, that old-school adjective reappeared Tuesday night.
Except the boss was not the Cook County Democratic Party but the Chicago Teachers Union.
Ald. Brian Hopkins, 2nd, marveled at Johnson’s ground support on polling day, saying there had been at least three CTU members or staffers in precincts he had visited Tuesday in neighborhoods such as Old Town, Streeterville, Lincoln Park, Wicker Park and the Gold Coast, Fran Spielman reported early Wednesday in the Sun-Times. Voters in those areas abandoned Lightfoot, who had warred with the CTU, in large numbers and chose the more progressive Johnson instead.
“They’re everywhere,†Hopkins told Spielman, referencing the CTU workers. “It’s a saturation ground game — even in precincts where Johnson was not expected to do well. If they have that many people to spare, that’s incredible. It’s something to see. This is the new machine.â€
Hopkins, who is supporting Vallas, has a partisan view and agenda. But the evidence Tuesday night, when a lesser known candidate with largely socialist positions vanquished a sitting, center-left mayor with a growing national profile in sympathetic media outlets, certainly suggested he had a point. Much media attention had been paid to the vast amounts of money that the CTU had injected into the mayoral campaign, but the ground game probably proved to be the more significant mover of the numbers and perhaps a harbinger of what is to come in the April runoff.
An argument could be made that the politically pejorative “machine†can be applied to any coalition one does not support; you could call the business community a “machine,†or use it to describe the Fraternal Order of Police, or firefighters and first responders. Or you could apply the term to racially identifiable groups. And anyone who was out there ringing doorbells for their candidate was not only exhibiting their constitutional right but also showing admirable commitment to the political process.
But while we congratulate Johnson and Vallas on making it to the runoff, we do remind them of the long history of fealty to sponsoring organizations, leading to corruption and moral compromise. The old machine was often compared to the Politburo and not without reason. We note the importance of transparency. And we assert that asking about a candidate’s independence from a larger agenda is not only a fair question but also one that demands an honest answer. Especially if we are talking independence from an entity that is doing a very fine job of helping them get elected.
I haven’t seen a precinct captain around here for at least 20 years. There’s a good reason for that. Precinct captains were recruited by promising them cushy (sometimes no-show) patronage jobs and the political parties don’t have those to offer any more.
But the CTU does.
The Trib endorsed Vallas; the Sun-Times no longer endorses candidates.
