CHCICAGO, Illinois — Chicago is hosting the Democratic National Convention in 2024. Milwaukee, about an hour’s drive to the north, is hosting the Republican National Convention.
Rarely have both parties’ nominating conventions been in such close proximity to one another. Republicans took the conventional approach of hosting their convention in a swing state, Wisconsin, that they must win to retake the White House. The Democrats chose … well … Illinois.
It is not quite clear why President Joe Biden — who reportedly was personally involved in the decision — chose the Windy City (so nicknamed for its politicians, not its weather). Chicago has become the archetypal example of Democratic Party misrule. In recent years, for example, it has become the murder capital of America, a fact highlighted every Monday when weekend shootings are tallied. The killings persist despite strict gun control.
Chicago has been losing residents for decades — as has Illinois. Unlike other Midwestern states, which went red in the Tea Party revolution of 2010, Illinois remained under Democratic control. Republican billionaire Bruce Rauner won in 2014, but lacked the strength to follow through on his promised reforms. And despite the state’s left-wing policies and “woke” ideology, Illinois ranks dead last among the 50 states on racial economic equality.
In 1996, when Democrats gathered in Chicago to nominate Bill Clinton for reelection, the city had swagger. The economy was booming and the city was enjoying an urban renaissance, as college graduates whose parents had moved to the suburbs came back to the city. Basketball star Michael Jordan, back from a short retirement, had just won the first championship of his second three-peat, replacing Al Capone as the city’s most recognized icon.
There was the troubling legacy of 1968, a year when the party’s anti-war left wing and its establishment fought on the convention floor and on the streets outside. That was the year that Senator Robert F. Kennedy of New York had been poised to win the nomination until he was assassinated by a crazed Palestinian in Los Angeles. The embittered and divided party hobbled into the November election and lost to Republican Richard Nixon.
Clinton’s win — alongside his wife, Hillary, a native of the Chicago suburbs — helped the city shake off those demons. And Barack Obama’s historic victory 12 years later in 2008 seemed to fulfill the highest hopes of a generation of Chicago reformers, who had long hoped to bridge the city’s racial divides on a platform of radical change. They began with Mayor Harold Washington — Obama’s hero — and found their way to the White House.
But Chicago politics did not work on a national scale. Obama’s focus on regulation and redistribution, produced the slowest economic recovery since the Second World War. He also inaugurated an era of identity politics — unnecessarily so, since he had the potential to bridge racial and cultural divides. While the Fed enriched Wall Street, Obama’s policies left Main Street behind. The result was a backlash that led to the rise of Donald Trump.
Chicago’s contribution to the Trump era was the inauguration of “cancel culture,” when Trump was forced to cancel a rally in the city in 2016 because of threats of violence. The city was also the stage for the most notorious hate crime hoax in American history — the Jussie Smollett case, when the Hollywood star falsely claimed to have been assaulted by MAGA hat-wearing Trump fans in a liberal city on one of the coldest nights in its history.
The following year, Chicago elected Lori Lightfoot, proudly touted as the city’s first black female mayor — and its first openly lesbian mayor as well. These attributes, as well as Lightfoot’s history as a federal prosecutor, did not help her manage the city. Instead, Chicago became synonymous with violence and mismanagement during her tenure. Instead of bringing about greater tolerance, Lightfoot even tried racially segregating the city press corps.
This year, Chicago voters had a prime opportunity to remove Lightfoot from office. And they did so, defeating her in the Democratic primary. But they went on to elect a mayor who is even more radical: Brandon Johnson, a friend of the teachers’ unions who run the city’s decrepit schools and enjoy unchallenged power over the rest of civic life. Things are so bad that even the Chicago Bears are trying to leave for better prospects in the suburbs.
The city’s skyline is still spectacularly beautiful, as is Lake Michigan, shimmering in the summer sunshine. But the legacy of Chicago’s glorious past, and the endowments of nature, cannot save the city from sinking into ruin. If Biden hopes to highlight some of his few economic successes, such as the revival of American manufacturing, he will also have to explain the flight of companies and jobs from the Chicago area — often to deep-“red” states.
Biden was in Chicago last week, as was Democratic rival Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is hoping to pick up where his father left off in 1968. If he does, Chicago might yet be a symbol of rebirth — as in 1860, when it hosted the Republican convention that nominated Abraham Lincoln; or when it rose from the ashes of the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.
But for now, Chicago’s role in 2024 will be to serve as a target for Republicans, one hour north.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
