Lori Lightfoot, the embattled mayor of Chicago, was criticized on Monday after a night of looting and riots in the city’s exclusive Magnificent Mile after appearing more concerned that there was a gay beach party the day before.
Lightfoot, who is a lesbian, took to Twitter to post a photo of half-naked men congregating at a beach and wrote, “It’s called a pandemic, people. This reckless behavior on Montrose Beach is what will cause us to shut down the parks and lakefront. Don’t make us take steps backwards.”
It is not uncommon for Democrat mayors to turn a blind eye to violent agitators while calling out others. New York’s Mayor Bill de Blasio was widely criticized for calling out a Hasidic Jewish funeral earlier in the pandemic while disregarding other communities disregarding the lockdown orders.
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But Lightfoot’s tweet opened the liberal mayor to new criticism since the city saw its worst night of riots in recent memory.
The city experienced looting into the early morning hours after a police-involved shooting that injured an armed suspect who allegedly fired at responding officers. There was a tense exchange between police officers and the community, which led to a night of chaos, and over a dozen stores looted.
There were over 100 arrests in the city still trying to recover from riots weeks ago over the death of George Floyd in police custody. On Sunday night, 400 police officers were sent to downtown Chicago to respond to the mayhem.
“This was not an organized protest rather than this was an incident of pure criminality,” Police Supt. David Brown said, according to NBC Chicago. “This was an act of violence against our police officers and against our city.”
Lightfoot has been widely criticized over her reaction to the earlier protests and the violence in the city in general. In May, she clashed with Chicago Alderman Raymond Lopez who warned that “gang bangers with AK-47s” could eventually make their way into the suburbs.
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“You got them all pumped today… They’re not going to go to bed at 8 o’clock. They’re going to turn their focus on the neighborhoods. I’ve got gang-bangers with AK-47s walking around right now, just waiting to settle some scores. What are we going to do, and what do we tell residents, other than good faith people stand up? It’s not going to be enough,” he said.
She told him at the time that he was “full of s—.”
The violence in the Windy City got the attention of President Trump who vowed to send federal agents in to help the city get a grip on the surging amount of violent crimes.
Trump has called Chicago a disaster and said that Lightfoot is making a big mistake in opposing these agents.