Mayor Lori Lightfoot on Violence in Chicago, and William Finnegan on the Power of Police Unions

The New Yorker Radio Hour

WNYC Studios and The New Yorker

Books, Society & Culture, Remnick, Storytelling, Wnyc, News, David, Yorker, Arts, Politics, New

4.2 • 6.2K Ratings

🗓️ 31 July 2020

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Before she became the mayor of Chicago, last year, Lori Lightfoot spent nearly a decade working on police reform. Now Lightfoot is facing civil unrest over police brutality and criticism by the President for the homicide and shooting rates in her city. David Remnick spoke with Mayor Lightfoot about the state of the city, policing, and President Trump’s recent decision to send two hundred federal agents to help “drive down violent crime.” Plus, The New Yorker’s William Finnegan reports on what the repeal of an arcane law reveals about the conflict among police, protesters, and politicians.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is The New Yorker Radio Hour, a co-production of WNYC Studios and The New Yorker.
0:09.7	Welcome to The New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm David Remnick. Until becoming mayor of Chicago last year,
0:16.0	Lori Lightfoot had never held elected office, but she'd served as a prosecutor and spent nearly a decade
0:21.9	working on police reform. Now she's contending with civil unrest over police violence, and at the
0:27.7	same time, the president of the United States is constantly attacking her for the city's
0:33.3	homicide and gun violence rates. Last week, Donald Trump announced that he's sending to Chicago
0:38.5	200 federal agents. You have the hardest job in America, maybe. They used to say that about
0:45.0	New York City. Being a big city mayor is tough no matter where you sit. I can't imagine. So let's
0:51.3	begin. President Trump recently announced that he was sending 200 federal agents to Chicago to do what he called fight crime. Were you involved in that decision?
1:02.0	No, you know, the president frequently says things that may or may not actually be accurate. What hasn't happened yet, but I anticipate happening, is
1:14.1	additional resources to the FBI, DEA, ATF, to really plug into existing criminal investigations
1:24.5	around guns, gangs, and violent crime. And unlike what happened in Portland,
1:31.2	I think the circumstances are different despite the rhetorical flourishes that come from the
1:37.7	president and others in his administration. It sounds like you welcome the help from President Trump.
1:44.0	I don't think of it as help from President Trump because there's a lot of things that
1:48.0	the president could do, which he refuses to do.
1:50.7	And I get it, I suppose.
1:52.5	But our biggest driver of violence is handguns.
1:55.6	Every single year, our police department seizes more illegal guns than New York City or L.A., and that's a massive number.
2:05.8	And the reason is we're surrounded by other jurisdictions that have very lax gun laws.
2:11.8	And if the president really wanted to do something that would be a game changer, do something around that, do something about assault
2:19.1	weapons, empower the ATF to truly regulate federally licensed gun dealers.
	...

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