Lightfoot: ‘We did not stand by to watch the South and West Sides burn’

Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Monday denied protecting downtown at the expense of Chicago neighborhoods, but said violence and looting “spread like wildfire” through the South and West Sides on Sunday in a way that would have overwhelmed a police department of any size.

Between Friday and Sunday, Chicago’s 911 emergency center fielded well over 10,000 calls for looting, the mayor said. On Sunday alone, there were 65,000 calls for all types of service. That’s 50,000 more than a “typical day,” the mayor said. As the day wore on, there were 2,000 calls every 30 minutes.

It was Chicago’s most violent weekend of the year, with 82 shootings and 19 homicides. On Sunday alone, there were 48 shootings and 17 homicides, CPD Supt. David Brown said, noting that 132 Chicago Police officers were injured. One officer suffered a heart attack.

“The challenge was, it was everywhere. ... We did not stand by to watch the South and West Sides burn, as some have propagated. That is simply not true,” Lightfoot said, calling the suggestion “deeply offensive for me as a black woman and for the superintendent as a black man.”

The Chicago Police Department had a “significant amount of additional resources” on the South and West Sides and did the “best they could” to respond, the mayor said.

“I want to be absolutely clear on this: There is no way we would ever let any neighborhood receive more resources and protection than any others. Ever. … The strategy yesterday was to add more personnel and services to neighborhoods on the South and West Sides. And that’s what happened.”

The mayor described as “nothing short of devastating” the updates she got from aldermen and community leaders Sunday about unrelenting attacks on local storefronts — particularly black-owned businesses.

Screenshot from Facebook video

“I know that, for many of you, your life’s work went into developing these businesses and commercial centers. I know that, for many of you, your blood, sweat and tears went into recruiting businesses to come support the vibrancy of your communities,” the mayor said.

“We will be your partner in rebuilding. … The need is even more great after what we’ve seen over the last 24 and 48 hours. We will rebuild,” Lightfoot said, adding that “Chicago government will lead those rebuilding efforts. We are not going to leave our neighborhoods behind. That will not happen on my watch.”

Lightfoot branded as “totally misguided,” the suggestion that Chicago police officers stood idly by as people looted South and West Side businesses. CPD Supt. David Brown agreed — and backed up his boss with statistics.

“During the downtown looting Saturday, we made a little over 300 arrests. Some for looting. Some for disorderly [conduct]. Yesterday, when … all of our resources were deployed to the neighborhoods — West Side, South Side — we made over 700 arrests. [More than] twice the effort in the neighborhoods,” Brown said.

“If the narrative was true, you would have greater numbers in the downtown area. … So the facts just don’t support the presumption that we did something more in downtown than we did in the neighborhoods.”

Ashlee Rezin Garcia/Sun-Times

Protesters often invoked George Floyd by demanding that officers “say his name,” Brown said. It was Floyd’s death last week in police custody in Minneapolis that sparked protests there and now across the country. Brown said he had whispered Floyd’s name as he was out supporting his officers on Sunday.

“To the rioters and looters, you disgrace the name of Mr. Floyd by your actions,” Brown said. “Hate can never drive out hate. Evil can never drive out evil.”

Brown said the havoc was wreaked by rioters who thought they were being clever by using bait-and-switch tactics.

“I was on ground with [Deputy Chief Ernest] Cato on the West Side where you had this distraction technique to misdirect our resources in one area so they could really attack the more predominant retail that we were trying to keep and hold, which was their true target,” the superintendent said.

“We didn’t take the bait. We sent enough resources to put the small fires out ... then, we came back and held the predominant retail on the West Side. It really was smart policing with the right tone. When looters got aggressive, we made arrests. When they dispersed when we got on scene — either it was pepper spray or other less-lethal tools — we moved around, but held the predominant area that we think were the true target of these looters.”

The arguments from Lightfoot and Brown did not appease a handful of aldermen, who argued Monday that Chicago needs 3,000 National Guardsmen — not the 375 summoned to Chicago by Gov. J.B. Pritzker — to protect neighborhoods under siege from looters.

Aldermen Anthony Beale (9^th) and Ray Lopez (15^th) made the request, arguing that deploying those National Guard troops to seal off the perimeter of the downtown area had left South and West side neighborhoods unprotected.

Brown countered 375 was an “adequate number.” Adding more than that could “cause more problems than solutions” and destroy the “fragile” trust that the Chicago Police Department is attempting to build with the African-American community, the superintendent said.

Lightfoot said the CTA was also shut down overnight because people were “trying to commandeer buses” and threatening bus drivers.

Beale argued that those thousands more National Guard troops are needed, in part, to protect what he called the “gem” of a Walmart in Pullman.

“It is one of the last stores available that was not looted where people can go can for food and prescription drugs,” Beale said.

“All of the other stores in my ward have been looted along Michigan Avenue and 103rd. There’s nothing else available where people can go and get anything except for that store. We need to protect it at all costs.”

Beale said the only reason the Walmart has been spared so far is because he worked with Chicago Police to close off all access on Woodlawn from 103rd to 111th streets.

West Side Ald. Jason Ervin (28^th), chairman of the City Council’s Black Caucus, agreed “additional resources” are needed from the National Guard to restore order to Chicago neighborhoods.

“Totally closing off the Gold Coast and downtown to access — people in our communities felt as if they were not as important as downtown and the Gold Coast. That fueled a lot of the anger and a lot of the challenges and concerns that people have,” Ervin said.

“When the decision was made, it may have made some sense. But after the fact, it seems like it fueled peoples’ anger and angst about what was going on. This is one city. Everybody deserves the same level of protection as anybody else. Some people feel protected, and others don’t feel protected.”

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Pressed on whether the city had a plan to protect Chicago neighborhoods, Ervin said, “I don’t know what they had. But whatever they had, it didn’t work.”

As frightening as the weekend was for all of us, herself included, Lightfoot urged Chicagoans not to take matters into their own hands in this concealed carry state.

“Do not pick up arms and try to be police. If there’s a problem, call 911,” she said.

“We will respond.”