Free Republic

Nineteen Chicago alderman are calling for an emergency meeting with Mayor Lori Lightfoot, demanding that she provide answers for the city's surging crime rates. Raymond Lopez, alderman for Chicago's 15th ward, told Fox News' Dana Perino on "America's Newsroom" that the city's leadership is not up for the job of keeping residents safe.

Residents in one Chicago ward are “giving up” on calling the police as the city fails to protect them from violent crime, according to one city council member. Alderman Raymond Lopez described the violence plaguing his constituents in the city’s 15th Ward and beyond, slamming Democratic Mayor Lori Lightfoot, whose law enforcement policies and focus on systemic racism, he said, are doing little to stop the mostly gang-related violence. “Generational gang life isn’t just something that’s encouraged. It’s almost revered in some neighborhoods,” Lopez, whose constituents are about 67% Latino and 22% black, told the Washington Examiner in an interview....

A bid by several aldermen to demand that Gov. J.B. Pritzker deploy the Illinois National Guard to Chicago in an effort to reduce escalating violence and sustained protests amid the coronavirus pandemic failed on Friday at a special meeting of the Chicago City Council. Although Mayor Lori Lightfoot dismissed the effort by Alds. Leslie Hairston (5th Ward), Anthony Beale (9th Ward), Raymond Lopez (15th Ward) and Anthony Napolitano (41st Ward) earlier this week to force the special City Council meeting as a stunt and an example of “grandstanding,” 47 aldermen attended the virtual meeting, ensuring it took place. Veteran City...

Four Chicago aldermen on Wednesday called for a special meeting of the City Council to consider a resolution asking Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker to declare a state of emergency and deploy the Illinois National Guard to the city over recent violence and looting. Alds. Leslie Hairston, Anthony Beale, Raymond Lopez and Anthony Napolitano issued the call in a letter to Chicago City Clerk Anna Valencia. The letter calls for a special meeting of the Chicago City Council at 10 a.m. on Friday to take up a resolution calling for the state of emergency and to hear from city and Cook...

In the ongoing effort to get control of the city’s streets, Mayor Lori Lightfoot staged a news conference last Friday that was meant to make a statement. Standing on a platform in Olive Park, offset by a sapphire Lake Michigan on a topaz-sky day, the Magnificent Mile’s skyscrapers served as backdrop. Aldermen, clergy, federal and state law enforcement officials all stood as socially distanced props. Lightfoot even invited Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx to stand within shouting distance of her new police superintendent, David Brown. Days earlier, Foxx had called out Brown and Lightfoot for “dishonest blame games,” after...

Fox News political analyst and Chicago native Gianno Caldwell called out the Democratic mayor of his hometown for abandoning the city's African-American residents, after Chicago experienced its single most violent day in six decades, amid protests and riots in the wake of the death of George Floyd. "This is not a mayor who is for the people. This is not a mayor, who the African-Americans, who mostly put her in office, this is not who they picked," said Caldwell on "Fox and Friends" on Wednesday, blasting Mayor Lori Lightfoot. "She is an elitist and she's proven it — time and...

As looters were ransacking businesses throughout the city more than a week ago, Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Ald. Raymond Lopez (15th), one of her harshest critics, engaged in an angry and foul-mouthed argument over the city’s handling of the widespread violence. During a conference call with all 50 aldermen on May 31 to discuss the city’s response to the looting, Lopez accused the mayor of being unprepared when looting spread from downtown to the neighborhoods that weekend. Looters pillaged shops throughout the city as peaceful protesters were taking to the streets on the last weekend “When downtown is in lockdown,...