As
evidenced by the fact that Gery Chico, currently head of the Illinois State
Board of Education who ran for mayor against Emanuel back in 2011, says he is
supporting Rahm come the Feb. 24 elections.
BOTH
THE CHICAGO Sun-Times and Chicago Tribune reported this weekend that Chico, who
is of both Mexican and Lithuanian ethnic origins, plans to publicly back
Emanuel for mayor.
It
is part of the effort by Emanuel to try to ensure that Garcia doesn’t
completely dominate the votes of Latinos – who account for about 30 percent of
the city’s population.
If
anything, it means that Emanuel wants to repeat his level of Latino support
that he achieved in the 2011 election cycle that he managed to win without the
need for a run-off election.
Amongst
Latinos in 2011, Chico won the vote with about 40 percent, and another 20
percent preferring the mayoral aspirations of then-city Clerk Miguel del Valle.
Emanuel took about 30 percent of the Latino vote, with the three remaining
candidates (all African-American) splitting the remaining vote of under 10
percent.
THIS
TIME AROUND, there aren’t two mayoral candidates counting on Latino votes (del
Valle is of Puerto Rican origins) to bolster their overall totals.
So
perhaps Garcia manages to get about two-thirds of the Latino vote. So long as
Emanuel gets the other third, he’s likely to think he has “enough” of the
Latino vote to combine for an overall total large enough to win.
Which
could mean that if he keeps the same Latinos who voted for him in ’11, he doesn’t
have to do reach out to anybody new!
The
key to comprehending Latino political empowerment in Chicago is to keep one
thing in mind – there are those who think that Latinos benefit in the long run
by taking on the political establishment and replacing its members with “one of
our own,” while there are others who merely want to be a part of the
establishment.
ALDERMANIC
AND LEGISLATIVE elections often turn into political fights between people of
those two groups. Emanuel is likely to want Latinos who are willing to keep the
basic structure in place in exchange for a piece of the overall political pie.
Having
someone like Chico, who once was president of the Chicago Board of Education
and who is a prominent attorney whose firm does business with city government,
is likely to appeal to those individuals.
As
is the fact that even Rep. Luis Gutierrez, D-Ill., is willing to publicly back
Emanuel’s re-election bid. The mayor may well have two of the most prominent
Spanish names on the local political scene backing him.
It’s
not likely that those two would be sticking their necks out publicly if they
didn’t think there was a chance that Emanuel could overcome the hostility he
faces in some quarters of the city and get himself re-elected.
THAT
COULD BE the key to comprehending the mayoral election we’re going to have in
Chicago.
There
are those who are greatly offended that Emanuel was willing to close down so
many schools in the Chicago Public Schools system contained in non-white
neighborhoods of the city. There are those who have their grudges who will be
very outspoken in coming months about how much they detest Emanuel.
But
there are others who will want to think that those people are just interested
in shouting and screaming about something, anything! They’re going to be more
than willing to maintain the status quo.
And
if it winds up prevailing into a new term come May, the Latino political powers
could be the people who are now willing to put themselves out there on Rahm’s
behalf now.
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