There was some more good news for progressives in non-federal elections last week besides the big wins for Chicago Mayor-elect Brandon Johnson and for Wisconsin Justice-elect Janet Protasiewicz. Primary School had 3 important Midwest stories, starting with Wisconsin. They wrote that Protasiewicz 11 point rout of MAGA freak Daniel Kelly “had a very neat side effect of absolutely wrecking moderates and conservatives running for unrelated local offices. Bill Brash, the conservative, de facto Republican chief judge of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals, originally appointed to the bench by Scott Walker, lost 68%-31% to Democratic Party-backed labor lawyer Sara Geenen in District 1, coterminous with Milwaukee County. His attempts to fool voters with appeals to the election’s technically nonpartisan nature went nowhere. Republican-collaborating Democratic state Sen. Lena Taylor lost her race for a Milwaukee municipal judgeship to progressive legal aid attorney Molly Gena by a narrower 51%-48% margin.” Primary school also noted that teachers union-backed city employee Andrea Pratt beat Assemblyman David Bowen in District 1 of the Milwaukee’s city council.
St Louis also had municipal elections that went very well for progressives. These were the contests that went well: “Progressive incumbent Ald. Anne Schweitzer fended off conservative Tony Kirchner in relatively conservative Ward 1, progressive Ald. Bret Narayan beat centrist fellow Ald. Joe Vaccaro in Ward 4, progressives Daniela Velázquez and Alisha Sonnier easily won the open Wards 6 and 7, progressive Ald. Shameem Clark Hubbard beat realtor Emmett Coleman in Ward 10, and progressive state Rep. Rasheen Aldridge defeated conservative realtor Ebony Washington, the latest scion of a local political dynasty, in the open Ward 14.”
And that brings us to Chicago, where Brandon Johnson’s multi-racial coalition of Black voters on the South and West Sides, Latino voters on the Southwest and Near Northwest Sides, and left-leaning white voters on the Near Northwest Side and the Far North Side lakefront, with youth turnout through the roof compared to the first round gave the Chicago progressive movement’s aldermanic candidates runoff election wins in Johnson-voting wards.
On the South Side, community organizer Desmon Yancy eked out a narrow victory over tough-on-crime crusader Tina Hone in Ward 5, and pastor/organizer William Hall comfortably defeated police officer Richard Wooten in Ward 6; along the lakefront, DSA-endorsed housing activist Angela Clay easily beat Walgreens executive Kim Walz in Ward 46, and Johnson-endorsed progressive activist Leni Manaa-Hoppenworth narrowly won over machine- and labor-backed developer Joe Dunne in Ward 48. More traditional machine-friendly candidates Lamont Robinson and Ronnie Mosley won the open South Side Wards 4 and 21 over Prentice Butler and Cornell Dantzler, respectively, but both winners were the clear preference of Chicago progressives and both made commitments to progressive policy priorities like the Treatment Not Trauma campaign. Conservatives gained one seat with Peter Chico’s victory in Ward 10, but centrist Alds. Nicole Lee in Ward 11 and Timmy Knudsen in Ward 43 fended off challenges from their right in wards even more conservative and Vallas-friendly than Ward 10. Sadly, they weren’t the only incumbent alderpersons to survive runoffs; every incumbent who was forced into a runoff won. That means nepotism case Monique Scott in Ward 24, squishy moderate cop Chris Taliaferro in Ward 29, failed centrist congressional candidate Gil Villegas in Ward 36, and absolutely unhinged conservative Jim Gardiner in Ward 45 will also be returning to the council. Finally, in what might have been the most confusing runoff of the night, Vallas-voting Ward 30 was won by college administrator Ruth Cruz, the choice of organized labor and outgoing Ald. Ariel Reboyras, over Jessica Gutiérrez, the daughter of former Rep. Luis Gutiérrez who challenged Reboyras four years ago. Despite the Reboyras connections, Cruz became the choice of progressives in the runoff (DSA endorsee Warren Williams placed third) and made plenty of policy commitments to match her newfound allies on the left, while Gutiérrez…did not, so it’s good that Cruz won.
Mayor Johnson will not have a progressive majority on the city council; he’ll still need the votes of more moderate alderpersons to implement the bolder parts of his agenda. However, the progressive bloc on the incoming city council is larger and more cohesive than the outgoing council’s fractious, disorderly progressive grouping, and plenty of the council’s returning moderates are transactional types who might be persuaded to vote for Johnson agenda items like increased social services, nonviolent first responders, and taxes on the rich—so long as they and their wards get something out of the deal. Chicago progressives are feeling great for good reason: they have a larger share of the city council than they’ve had in decades, and one of their own as mayor.