Chicago’s mayor spent the weekend thundering about “democracy,” “fascism,” and the Constitution. Then he showed up on MSNBC and—under the hottest spotlight of his tenure—stumbled over the simplest question in public safety: would more cops on the street make Chicago safer? Joe Scarborough asked it five times. Brandon Johnson couldn’t say yes. He filibustered about housing, mental health, and youth jobs until he was forced to mutter that the police must be “fully supported.” Translation: with Trump threatening federal muscle, even the most progressive mayor knows he can’t keep sneering at cops.
Let’s set the scene. After deploying forces to Washington, D.C., President Trump said Chicago could be next if local leaders won’t get a handle on crime. Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Mayor Johnson staged a press conference to warn him off and swear they’ll fight any National Guard deployment in court. “Do not come to Chicago,” Pritzker barked. Johnson called it a “flagrant violation” of the Constitution. The tough talk sounded great on cable… right up until the mayor had to explain why more officers wouldn’t help.
Here’s what’s really happening: pressure works. The moment a real, accountable standard is imposed—results, not rhetoric—ideologues scramble to claim progress they once said policing could never deliver. And to be fair, Chicago has seen progress. Homicides and shootings have fallen sharply over the last two years. Through June 29, 2025, murders were down 32 percent year-to-date compared with 2024, according to CPD’s own CompStat reports; local outlets pegged the first-half drop at roughly one-third. That’s good news for every family in the city.
But that’s only half the story. Chicago’s leadership wants you to believe this decline proves their “housing-and-healing” thesis while policing remains a side dish. Yet the same mayor now touting a safer city is the one who ran on “Treatment Not Trauma” and embraced the spirit (if not the literal slogan) of defunding. When the cameras are off, he still argues the “antiquated” approach is more officers; when the cameras are on—and Trump is looming—he assures us the police will be “fully supported.” That’s not strategy; that’s spin under duress.
Moreover, the public understands what the studio roundtables evade: crimes that terrorize daily life—robberies, carjackings, retail theft, motor-vehicle theft—exploded in the pandemic era and remain elevated compared with pre-2019 norms, even as some categories fall. The Council on Criminal Justice’s mid-year 2025 review shows carjacking rates dropping versus last year across the cities that publish data—great—but they rose dramatically after 2019 and have not simply vanished. Jeff Asher’s compilation illustrates Chicago’s story: 736 carjackings in 2019, a staggering 2,151 by 2021, and only in the last couple of years have those numbers started meaningfully receding. Progress, yes; solved, no.
So why the mayoral panic about National Guard talk if the trendlines are so rosy? Because voters notice the gap between the press release and the street. Chicago ended 2024 with fewer than 600 murders for the first time since 2019—again, a real improvement—but residents still deal with chronic car theft, brazen daylight robberies, and a downtown retail corridor that hasn’t fully recovered from repeated waves of lawlessness. When Washington threatens to measure outcomes instead of slogans, local leaders suddenly find the microphone to praise police, green-light targeted surges, and brag about falling numbers—while insisting none of it has anything to do with pressure from the feds. Pull the other one.
The mayor’s constitutional argument also rings hollow. No one disputes there are legal hurdles (and plenty of debate) around using Guard units for general law enforcement. Illinois’ attorney general is already previewing lawsuits. Fine—fight it out. But that legal battle doesn’t answer the moral one: why, after years of lecturing the city that more officers aren’t the answer, is Johnson now carefully talking about “fully supporting” the department? Why did that clarity arrive only when the White House threatened to grade his performance?
Chicagoans don’t need culture-war theater; they need competence. Competence sounds like this: keep backing the homicide and shooting reductions with visible patrols in hot spots, quick-hit warrant teams for the worst actors, and detective staffing sufficient to push clearance rates higher. Flood high-theft corridors with license-plate readers and bait-car operations. Make downtown feel predictably safe with consistent enforcement against smash-and-grabs and retail mobbing. None of that is incompatible with expanding mental-health co-responder teams or youth jobs. It’s both/and—not the false choice the mayor tried to sell until a national spotlight scorched away the talking points.
Here’s the political reality the Left hates to admit: Trump’s threat exposed who’s been coasting and who’s been working. If your city is genuinely improving, you welcome scrutiny. If your strategy relies on abstracts and euphemisms, you howl about “authoritarianism” and hope voters forget the last five years. Chicago’s mayor can’t have it both ways. He can bask in the declines—and he should, because every saved life matters—but he doesn’t get to pretend he’s always been the champion of “fully supported” policing while smearing cops as an “antiquated” fix yesterday and mumbling about partnerships today.
So yes, Trump is embarrassing bad mayors into doing better—sometimes only rhetorically, sometimes for real. In Chicago, the proof is in the pivot. Johnson moved from scolding to scrambling, from dismissing officers to insisting he backs them, the instant accountability arrived at O’Hare’s gate. If a little presidential pressure is what it takes to keep city halls focused on safety over slogans, then by all means: turn up the heat. Chicago’s families deserve leaders who don’t find their courage only when a TV chyron forces it.