4 in 5 Chicagoans Disapprove of Dem Mayor, Poll Finds

Only 8.2 percent of residents support Brandon Johnson’s reelection, according to poll

Chicago mayor Brandon Johnson (D.) is grappling with historic levels of voter disapproval over his handling of the city’s migrant influx and his pushback against President Donald Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration.

An overwhelming 79.9 percent of Chicago residents disapprove of Johnson’s leadership, while only 6.6 percent view the Democrat favorably, according to a poll that M3 Strategies released on Saturday. The mayor’s favorability rating is even lower than in October of last year, when Johnson became the most unpopular mayor in Chicago history.

Around 67 percent of voters, meanwhile, identify crime as Chicago’s most pressing issue, with respondents also citing high taxes and inflation as top concerns at 54 percent and 41 percent, respectively. “LGBTQ+ rights,” at 3 percent, and “reproductive freedom,” at 4 percent, are voters’ lowest concerns, the poll found.

Johnson, who was elected mayor in 2023, is electorally underwater in the poll, with only 8.2 percent support. His primary rivals, Illinois secretary of state Alexi Giannoulias and former Chicago schools chief Paul Vallas, are leading with 27.4 percent and 21 percent, respectively. Giannoulias boasts a 49 percent favorability rating, while Vallas has 41 percent, according to the poll.

Johnson has long faced backlash over his handling of Chicago’s migrant crisis, with residents decrying his proposed tax hike to cover a budget deficit as the city spends over half a billion dollars on migrant shelters. The mayor, though, has criticized the Trump administration’s response to the crisis, saying that arresting and deporting illegal immigrants is “attempting to get us to surrender our humanity.”

The Department of Justice sued Chicago and Illinois earlier this month, arguing that the city’s and state’s sanctuary laws “interfere” with the administration’s immigration enforcement policies.

Illinois and Chicago “refuse to cooperate with detainers,” a DOJ official told the New York Post. “Instead of handing over people who are in prison or in jail to federal immigration authorities they will just let folks go.”

Chicago’s Welcoming City ordinance prohibits any city agency or official from arresting or detaining “a person solely on the belief that the person is not present legally in the United States.”