Mayor Johnson goes to Springfield

Mayor Brandon Johnson visited Springfield last week to get Chicago “its fair share” of state money. The April 30 visit comes as both the General Assembly and the City Council look to close multimillion-dollar budget holes.

According to the Chicago Tribune , Johnson outlined four priorities for meetings with lawmakers, which included a half-hour meeting with Governor J.B. Pritzker and sit-downs with house speaker Emanuel “ Chris” Welch and senate president Don Harmon : an expanded prepaid cell phone tax, a renewed wireless surcharge for 911 services, increased funding for the city’s homeless shelter system, and greater state investment in Chicago Public Schools.

A hot-button item in Springfield that’s not on Johnson’s wish list concerns the future of Chicago-area public transportation. Leaders of the Chicago Transit Authority, Metra, Pace, and their administrative body, the Regional Transportation Authority, have warned that they’ll be forced to drastically cut service in response to a $700 million fiscal cliff left by expiring federal COVID relief funding if lawmakers fail to allocate additional funds this session. Policymakers have maintained there will be “no new revenue without reform” and pushed ahead with a plan to consolidate the four regional transit agencies under the banner of the Metropolitan Mobility Authority. Lawmakers, transit agencies, and other parties are reportedly close to a deal, according to Capitol News Illinois .

The Tribune reports Johnson didn’t push lawmakers on funding for a new Bears stadium . The mayor previously came out in support of a new, domed stadium for the Chicago football team and, during his last Springfield visit in May 2024, lobbied for taxpayer dollars to finance its construction.

Solidarity forever

On May 1, thousands of Chicagoans, armed with union banners and picket signs, gathered at Union Park to commemorate International Workers’ Day. The annual event on the near west side took on new significance this year under a fascist administration that is openly hostile to both workers and immigrants.

The overwhelming message from the more than two dozen speakers to address the crowd—including U.S. representative Jesús “Chuy” García , Mayor Johnson, Chicago Teachers Union president Stacy Davis Gates , and Northwestern University law professor Sheila Bedi —was that workers’ rights and immigrants’ rights are inextricably linked. Whether you’re a low-wage service worker on Chicago’s south side, a family fleeing violence in Venezuela, or a journalist documenting the genocide in Gaza, Donald Trump ’s attacks on any of us are an attack on all of us.

After two and a half hours of speeches in Union Park, the crowd of more than 10,000 marched three miles east to Grant Park, where organizers planned to hear from yet more speakers. At one point, a group of marchers paused near the site of the Haymarket massacre, where, 139 years earlier, Chicago police attacked protesters demanding an eight-hour work day in a clash that eventually spurred International Workers’ Day. As an organizer explained the event’s significance, I paused to take a picture of a demonstrator’s sign. It read, “We are the many. They are the few.”

On the trail

U.S. representative Jan Schakowsky plans to retire from Congress, the 80-year-old Democrat announced at her 24th annual Ultimate Women’s Power Lunch on Monday. In March, 26-year-old progressive social media influencer Kat Abughazaleh launched her campaign for the seat Schakowsky has held since 1999, and state senator Laura Fine threw her hat in the ring on Tuesday. In an interview with Jewish Insider , Fine “touted her pro-Israel platform and described herself as a staunch defender of the Jewish state.”

Schakowsky joins her colleague Senator Dick Durbin in deciding not to run again in 2026. Lining up to replace Durbin are Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton and U.S. representative Robin Kelly , who launched her Senate campaign on Tuesday.

On Sunday, northwest-side Democratic Party leaders selected former City Council staffer Jessica Vasquez to replace outgoing Cook County commissioner Anthony Quezada on the county board. Quezada left in April to fill former alder Carlos Ramirez-Rosa ’s spot on the City Council after Mayor Johnson selected Ramirez-Rosa to lead the Chicago Park District. Vasquez, who was previously Ramirez-Rosa’s chief of staff, will serve out the remaining 18 months of Quezada’s term and said in a press release that she plans to run for reelection in March 2026.

Alder Brendan Reilly is flirting with a challenge to Cook County board president Toni Preckwinkle next year. The conservative City Council member told the Tribune on April 30 that he had been “approached to take on Preckwinkle.” The same day, Reilly told the council’s public safety committee that Chicago police need expanded power to declare on-the-spot curfews to crack down on anti-Trump protests he anticipated would erupt this summer. In September, following Israel’s deadly attack in Lebanon using bombs disguised as pagers, Reilly tweeted a since-deleted photo of a pager displaying the words “mazel tov” and referred to Lebanese political party Hezbollah as “scum.”