UPDATE 4/16/23: Still more of Johnson in his own words is here, about his most recent comments praising Fred Hampton, who was a violent, communist Black Panther.
Several of our articles quoting Chicago Mayor-Elect Brandon Johnson verbatim are spreading separately on social media. We are providing this aggregation to help condense them. Please note that this does not include his various policy positions, such as a range of new taxes, that may not be captured in particular quotes. Instead, this is limited his own words on some of the most contentious issues and related segments from a few of our earlier columns:
From our March 23 column:
Standardized tests as eugenics against Blacks
Mayoral finalist Johnson has condemned “the tools that have been placed against Black folks that have been used violently” including “administering standardized tests….” This week he doubled down on the repellent theme in a debate with Vallas, saying that standardized tests have “roots in eugenics to prove the inferiority of Black people.”
From our March 14 column:
“I never said defund the police”
This week Johnson is claiming, “I never said, defund the police.” But that’s not what the record shows. Confronted directly in last week’s Chicago mayoral debate, Johnson sidestepped any explanation of his 2020 comment – shown on video during the debate – that defunding police is not “a slogan, it’s an actual real political goal.”
Those comments by Johnson were one of a series of remarks that were either at odds with maintaining present funding levels for law enforcement, or that excused looting.
In 2020, as a Cook County Commissioner Johnson said, “Reducing the sheriff’s budget is a case that I believe that we want…There is no number big enough.”
That year speaking at an panel titled “We Don’t Call Police: A Town Hall on a Police-Free Future,” Johnson said, “part of it is removing ourselves away from this, you know, state-sponsored policing, but also the tools that have been placed against Black folks that have been used violently, whether it’s policing, or administering standardized tests, or … around how white supremacy finds its way in every facet of our lives, that we have to fight and resist that.”
Looting stemmed from “frustration and anguish”
As the city reeled from escalating deadly violence and anarchy in the streets in summer 2020, Johnson in a WGN-TV interview also defended looting as “an outbreak of incredible frustration and anguish” tied to “a failed racist system.”
In July, 105 residents were murdered. Then in August Chicago exploded in rioting and looting once more. A local TV station posted photos of “a night of unrest and looting.” Shown in this one collection of snapshots were numerous shattered store windows, a smashed ATM, a looted SUV and the detritus of a rampage at a Best Buy where consumer electronics goods were looted. Other nabbed handbags and other luxury items from high-end stores on Michigan Avenue.
These were some of the looters whom Johnson excused as acting in “frustration and anguish.”
Defenders of Chicago looters were working from a common script. In an interview with Chicago’s NPR affiliate, a local Black Lives Matter activist named Ariel Atkins said, “A lot of people are…like, ‘Oh, you support the looters.’ And yeah, we do, one hundred percent. That’s reparations…I will support looters ‘till the end of the day. If they need to do that in order to eat, then that’s what you’ve got to do to eat.”
Looted stores “have insurance and assurance”
Retailers weren’t taking it well, understandably. Johnson was asked by a WGN-TV interviewer at that time, “Do you worry about stores leaving Chicago and the county because they don’t think it’s safe?”
Johnson bristled at the concern. He replied, “these companies have insurance and assurance.” He also said, “you can’t take a certain level of urgency to protect capital and the wealthy and not have that same tenacity to provide relief for families that have been devastated through structural racism for generations.”
Johnson amplified the point, saying, “We have to redirect dollars away from a failed racist system and move it into the hands of people who really are trying their very best to survive day-to-day. And if we can’t do that as a government, we are failing to meet the moment…To continue to criminalize people, and to chastise folks for being poor, it’s tired and it’s old. We actually need a new direction that really calls for massive investments in neighborhoods.”
From our March 21 column:
How he taught in a public school
If you’re looking to make sense of why so few Chicago Public School students can read and do math at grade level, you’ll want to listen to Brandon Johnson’s words from a 2018 talk he gave along with author Mark Warren, a former professor at Harvard, and Bill Ayers of the Weather Underground.
Brandon Johnson has already told us he wants to rebel “against the structure.” The talk in question was published on YouTube by Midwest Socialist, a publication of the Chicago Democratic Socialists of America. Johnson is asked a question (45:38) regarding the politics around education and how he handled conflicts between his personal philosophy and the requirements of the education system – in particular because Johnson taught at a selective enrollment school. His response:
And so what it taught me, though, was pushing to eliminate some of the standardization of our public schools. My students, sometimes, would get frustrated. I didn’t offer any of the test prep that my other colleagues were pushing at the time. I was pushing our administration to move away from it.
To be quite frank with you, I didn’t issue a lot of homework for students. That was my own way of rebelling against the structure. I don’t think I ever gave a kid an ‘F.’ I don’t know how a student sits in front of you and fails. I know some professors may find that slightly troubling…”
I think the last thing is, it actually gave me that much more motivation to actually leave the class and become a full-time organizer with the CTU….
And this from CBS:
Why he hasn’t paid personal bills
A reporter asked last week asked Brandon, “If you’ve had past fiscal issues, how can you manage a massive city budget? This was in reference to documentation CBS found showing Johnson owed $3,357.04 in unpaid water and sewer bills in addition to the more than $400 his family owed for unpaid parking tickets. He also defaulted on a Capital One credit card to the sum of more than $3,600. It ended up in court, but was resolved in 2017, said CBS. Johnson’s answer:
It’s paid off. We took care of that. We didn’t want anyone else to be distracted by a water bill.
Look, having student debt and credit card debt, that makes me a Chicagoan.
Read more from Wirepoints:
- What has Chicago done?
- Four Things Springfield Should Do To Override Brandon Johnson And Salvage Chicago (But Probably Won’t)
- Why can only 6 of every 100 Chicago black students do math at grade level? Chicago Mayoral candidate Brandon Johnson offers some clues.
- A reminder for Chicago voters: 20 times Lori Lightfoot failed the city
- Brandon Johnson’s views on tolerance for violence and defunding police are absolutely clear. Here are his own words.
If Brandon Johnson were in his twenties, his comments and dereliction could possibly be excused as someone who is still learning to be a responsible adult. However Brandon Johnson is approaching the ripe age of 50, when most of us have learned all to well how to be responsible adults. Chicago is in for an eye opening experience with Brandon Johnson, and not in a good way. But, this is what people there wanted.
Go Brandon! Make Chicago into Detroit again!
Indeed.
Let’s go Brandon. Finish off Chicago.
I wonder how many of Johnson’s social workers sent in lieu of police will be maimed, injured and killed before that program is ended. I suspect that the stubborn and brainless “Woke” will ignore reality until the butchers bill is overwhelming.
None will be injured because none will be sent
We don’t want nobody that nobody sent….
Elections have consequences as does not voting. We’re about to learn what are those consequences and it will not be pretty. Only in Chicago would Brandon Johnson be considered an improvement to Lori Lightfoot.
I heard a reporter this morning describe him as a “former teacher and labor organizer”. No mention that the “labor” that he organizes is the CTU.
TIME TO LEAVE CHICAGO
Way past time to leave the City of Destruction.
Get out now before he makes you pay Chicago taxes on your out of state income.
As long as you can be a Progressive hypocrite, play the “Race Card “and say one thing and change it the next day, you can be elected
Usual commentary from a usual suspect. Things are bad, expect things to get worse. Hello toilet bowl.