Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot had a rough week. Activists have renewed calls for the mayor to resign after bodycam footage was released showing a cop shooting 13-year old Adam Toledo.
Additionally, Lightfoot was a trending topic on Twitter over what she called “homophobic, racist and misogynistic rumors.”
On Sunday morning Lightfoot posted a series of tweets addressing the rumors and also doubled down on her commitment to the city of Chicago.
Before she was elected in 2019, Lightfoot served as the president of the Chicago Police Board. She also chaired the Police Accountability Task Force that was assembled
following the 2014 fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald.During her run up to the 2019 election, Lightfoot pledged within her first 100 days to introduce her own plan to create civilian oversight of police. However, two years into her term as mayor that plan has not been introduced and relations between civilians and police in the city have deteriorated.
According to CNN, two police reform advocacy groups have introduced
a series of reforms that would allow Chicago voters to decide whether to hand a civilian oversight board the power to hire and fire the police set Chicago Police Department policy and negotiate police contracts.Lightfoot balked at the suggestion, and members of Chicago’s city council, including those that supported Lightfoot, have expressed frustration that she has not released her own plan. Chicago Alderman Gilbert Villegas, who resigned in February as Lightfoot’s hand -picked floor leader of the council, said the council should vote on the proposed reforms.
“The
reality is, time is of the essence. We’ve been talking about this for decades. The mayor talked about doing this in 100 days, and we’re going on two years. We need to do this now,” Villegas said according to CNN. “The mayor has had two years to put forward something. She has not. And so given the time that we’re in right now, we need to move on this as soon as possible.”“As we delay it,” Villegas added, “we’re losing the public’s trust.”
Alderman
Jeanette Taylor, who advocated for eliminating qualified immunity for police and shifting funding from police departments to community organizations, said she doesn’t believe Lightfoot will back any major police reforms that have been suggested.“It’s going to be something watered down and it’s not going to make any sense. It’s not going to come from the people,” Taylor told reporters last week. “All you’ve got to do is listen to the organizations. They’ve done the research, they’ve lived it, they’ve got the proof.”