Paul Vallas, one of the two finalists in the race for mayor of Chicago, has often criticized Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker (D).
Pritzker’s policies that Vallas has implemented include election-year tax cuts that Vallas considers an effort “stupid” votersreduction in a tax credit for low-income private school parents and, most importantly, a progressive governor a cautious approach to reopen public schools and lift the mask mandate during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking in a conservative talk-radio show in December 2021, Vallas, the former CEO of Chicago Public Schools, said that Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot relied on executive orders to implement public health policy because it “gives them the ability to act like a dictator” by circumventing the legislature.
Pritzker remains neutral in the Chicago mayoral runoff, which ends on April 4. In the contest, Vallas, a centrist, faces Cook County Commissioner Brandon Johnson, a progressive.
However, HuffPost asked Pritzker’s political staff if they had a response to Vallas’ criticism of the governor.
Pritzker campaign spokeswoman Natalie Edelstein responded with a statement that both defended Pritzker’s actions and took a subtle jab at Vallas, who has ties to right-wing talk radio.
“During the pandemic, Governor Pritzker is fighting every day to save people’s lives and livelihoods,” Edelstein said. “He did so by following the advice of the nation’s best virologists and epidemiologists, many of whom are at world-class research institutions and hospitals in Illinois.”
“Leadership requires making tough choices and not choosing the loudest voice driven by politics,” he said. “Chicago’s next mayor may be asked to lead in the same type of emergency and citizens need to know that the next mayor will listen to experts or even a right-wing talk show host when making decisions about people’s lives.”
HuffPost requested a response from the Vallas campaign.
“Paul Vallas looks forward to working with state leaders to address all the issues facing Chicago, from making the city safer to improving education to dealing with crisis situations as they arise,” Vallas campaign spokesman Phil Swibinski said in a statement. “As a lifelong Democrat, Paul respects Governor Pritzker’s leadership and voted for him in past elections.”
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Vallas, a charter school advocate backed by Chicago’s main police union, has run on a message to restore public safety. He proposed filling the police backlog of more than a thousand people in the city and revitalizing community policing without raising taxes.
Johnson, a former school teacher and organizer for the Chicago Teachers Union, previously embraced the idea of cutting police funding to fund social programs. He is now on track to use efficiency savings to add 200 detectives through promotions, as well as raise various taxes to fund youth projects and comprehensive mental health care.
Prolonged school closures in liberal cities and other non-pharmacological efforts to limit the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic have drawn criticism from across the ideological spectrum as some progressives assess the policy’s tradeoffs.
But Vallas’ criticism of Pritzker is part of a pattern of bashing famous Democrats and cozying up to right-wing activists, pundits, and even politicians, who have helped Johnson in his quest to establish Vallas as a Republican – and apparently even irked Pritzker.
In other right-wing radio appearances in recent years, Vallas has suggested that certain left-wing methods of teaching Black history create “an excuse for bad behavior,” and disparaged former President Barack Obama and President Joe Biden.
Vallas has a persistent frosty attitude toward Pritzker, which he shed in the same interview when he spoke critically of Obama and Biden.
Vallas even encouraged the leader of a right-wing parents’ rights group to fight Pritzker. He has since apologized for joining the group after learning of their views on LGBTQ issues.
Vallas leads Johnson by six percentage points in the only public poll conducted since the runoff took place.
To close the gap, Johnson hopes to convince moderate enough Democrats — especially moderate Black Democrats — that he’s the only real Democrat in the race.