Chicago’s Imperfect Choice

A huge event today could have a major impact on national politics—and it might not be the one you have in mind.

While a judge arraigns Donald Trump in New York City, voters in Chicago will be rendering their own verdict on who should lead the nation’s third-largest city: Paul Vallas, a 69-year-old former city-budget director and the former CEO of Chicago Public Schools, or Brandon Johnson, a 47-year-old county commissioner, former teacher, and longtime paid organizer for the city’s most progressive political force, the Chicago Teachers Union. The outcome could have meaning well beyond the shores of Lake Michigan, offering an indication of where voters—Democrats in particular—are leaning on the issues of crime, policing, and race.

For Chicagoans, though, this election is about more than augurings for the nation. are, far and, Chicago’s remains five times higher than New York City’s and 2.5 times higher than Los Angeles’s. , rose in almost every other major category, including robbery, burglary, theft, and motor-vehicle theft. Those numbers and the pervasive sense of unease about public safety had a lot to do with the defeat of incumbent Mayor Lori Lightfoot in the city’s nonpartisan primary in February.