Chicago set to make history with its first black woman as mayor

Former Chicago Police Board President Lori Lightfoot and Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, who are both Democrats, secured the two spots on the ballot for the April 2 general election in Tuesday’s nonpartisan primary for mayor of Chicago. Either Lightfoot or Preckwinkle would be the first black woman to serve as mayor of the Windy City, and Chicago will also soon become the largest city in America to ever be led by a woman of color. A Lightfoot victory would make Chicago the largest city in the country to ever be led by a gay mayor.

Lightfoot took first place on Tuesday’s 14-way race with 17 percent of the vote, while Preckwinkle edged former White House chief of staff Bill Daley, the son and brother of Chicago’s two longest-serving mayors, 16-15 to claim the second general election spot. Preckwinkle, who is also the leader of the Cook County Democratic Party, looked like a frontrunner, if not the frontrunner, from the moment she entered the race in September, but Lightfoot’s rise came as much more of a surprise.

Lightfoot, a former federal prosecutor, was one of several candidates who had kicked off a bid to unseat Mayor Rahm Emanuel. However, Emanuel surprised the city in September when he announced that he would retire, and soon a number of prominent politicians, including Preckwinkle, Daley, former Chicago Board of Education president Gery Chico, and state comptroller Susana Mendoza, entered the wide-open race to succeed him. Lightfoot, a first-time candidate, had considerably less name recognition than many of her new opponents, and until this month, not a single publicly released poll showed her taking more than 5 percent of the vote.

However, the race changed in January when Ed Burke, a powerful city alderman who has served since 1969, was indicted for attempted extortion. Burke had connections to Daley, Chico, and Mendoza, but it was Preckwinkle who attracted the most negative attention from all this. Burke's indictment alleged that he had pressured the owner of a Burger King franchise to donate $10,000 to a candidate, and Preckwinkle's campaign quickly acknowledged she was the recipient. Weeks later, the public learned that she had hired Burke’s son for a nearly $100,000-per-year post at a time when the younger Burke was facing two internal investigations by his previous employer.