Lightfoot's missteps and the pro-life movement's future
Political games shouldn't stop citizens, young and old, from engaging in politics in a better way — whether in civic education or the protection of human life from conception to natural death.
Don’t let Lightfoot’s political improprieties poison the well of action civics
By Pastor
You may have seen in the news that Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s reelection campaign sent emails to Chicago Public School teachers requesting that they encourage CPS students to get involved with her effort to win a second term as the city’s chief executive. It has also come to light that Lightfoot has been putting similar pressure on faculty and staff at Chicago City Colleges since August of last year.
Students engage in action civics, a hands-on way of teaching civics that inspires lifelong engagement in democracy. Photo credit: Mikva Challenge
Of course, the mayor and her team are trying everything they can to downplay this obviously inappropriate behavior, calling it a “well-intentioned mistake”. But, the mayor is the de facto boss of every employee of the City of Chicago and her sister agencies. With the city’s long history of patronage, the emails represent an unacceptable overreach.
But just because the mayor’s campaign should not solicit volunteers from among the ranks of Chicago’s schoolchildren, it does not mean that our students should not be involved with the ongoing mayoral election. They should be. Somebody should be reaching out to school teachers and encouraging them to get their students volunteering on mayoral campaigns. That message should not be coming from a mayor seeking reelection. That message should not direct students to one specific campaign. Teachers need to be encouraged to get students involved, supported in the process, and celebrated when they do.
There is a movement called “Action Civics” that was a big part of my life for more than a decade when as a student, an active supporter, and then as a board member, I was involved with the Mikva Challenge in Chicago. At the core of Mikva’s mission to develop youth to be empowered, informed, and active citizens is the practice of action civics, a kind of applied civics in which students learn by doing. The process begins with students examining their own lives and communities to identify the issues that matter most to them. Then they look at all of the candidates in the mayoral race based on their issues, proposals, and backgrounds.
Most civic lessons end there. But action civics goes further to connect students with those campaigns of candidates which they have determined represent their values and priorities. action civics walks with students through the volunteering process and provides spaces for reflection and deeper learning. Mikva is not the only organization promoting action civics in the United States, though they are the leader in the space here in Chicago. And they certainly should not be the only backer of the model.
The church should be entering into the space of action civics, not only with youth, but with people of all ages. We should be proactively urging our membership and friends to analyze the issues, examine the candidates, and then engage in campaigns. The church has the resources of people, spaces, and in many cases, the meager funds required to support this kind of robust civic engagement. In so doing, we would be discipling our congregations to be good stewards of the tremendous power granted to each of us citizens and voters.
The kind of corruption evident in the “well-intentioned mistake” LIghtfoot campaign made can only be run out of our politics if we shine the light of a well-informed, fully-engaged citizenry. One of the best ways to do this is by getting young people involved in civics and politics early. Research suggests that if they get involved early, then they’ll stay involved for the rest of their lives.
The Lightfoot campaign’s ill advised emails are not an argument for keeping politics away from our youth. On the contrary, it demonstrates why we must get our youth thoughtfully and meaningfully engaged.
The Round Up
Here are the stories that caught our eyes this week and what they mean for the weeks ahead.
In his second inaugural address, Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Monday pledged to fight for free college tuition for working-class families and more affordable and widespread health care and child care.
On the heels of Pritzker’s inauguration, Democrats moved swiftly during the lame duck session to pass a bill aimed at shoring up already expansive abortion rights in the state. Pritzker pledged to make Illinois as a “safe haven” for women seeking abortion in the Midwest.
According to a new report, traffic in Chicagoland expressways has skyrocketed from pandemic lockdown lows. Area commuters lost more hours thanks to traffic congestion than drivers in any other major U.S. city.
Chicago earned this dubious distinction for the second year running. The study’s authors at the mobility analytics firm Inrix found commuters logged more time in traffic than they had pre-pandemic. Trips to the city center held steady, so the rise in traffic had little to do with downtown office workers.
The average Chicagoland commuter spent 155 hours stuck in traffic along major routes in 2022, up from 104 hours in 2021, according to the report. That’s an increase of about 7 percent over pre-pandemic levels.
Colorado to stop busing migrants after pleas from Chicago and NYC mayors
Colorado will cease sending migrants to Chicago and New York, according to a press release from Colorado Gov. Jared Polis.
The move came after days of public discussion involving the Governor on one side and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and New York Mayor Eric Adams on the other regarding who should shoulder responsibility for supporting the individuals and families who make up the migrant influx.
Migrants disembark a CTA shuttle bus that reads “My Kind of Town” at Chicago’s Union Station after a 25-hour-long ride from Texas Sept. 9. Credit: Colin Boyle/Block Club Chicago
In a joint letter to Polis on Saturday, Adams and Lightfoot demanded that Colorado "cease and desist sending migrants to New York City and Chicago," saying resources in their respective cities were stretched to the breaking point.
Newsclips
Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker signs assault weapons ban as lawmakers shore up abortion rights
Chicago encouraged General Iron’s move to the Southeast Side, executive says
XBB.1.5 ‘Kraken' variant is in Chicago: local virologist breaks down what to know
Lake Michigan shoreline needs restoration, and local input on how to do it
Chicago Bears are expected to hire Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren as their new president/CEO
Mayoral race highlights
Lightfoot, García make first appearances at mayoral candidate forum
The pro-life movement can create a culture of life, but only if it leaves partisan politics behind
By
In a lame duck session this week, the supermajority Democratic conferences in both state houses in Illinois passed legislation that pushes the state further in the direction of pro-abortion extremism.
As promised repeatedly by Gov. J.B. Pritzker, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot and any Democratic Party politician within striking distance of a microphone, Illinois now stands as a “safe haven” for abortion in the Midwest.
The new state legislation includes provisions that would:
Allow the attorney general to investigate and request the court to impose fines to sidewalk counselors and unlicensed crisis pregnancy centers for providing pregnancy-related services.
Mandate a two-hour continuing education course about abortion for all health care workers involved in maternity care and other reproductive health care.
Allow Advanced Practice Registered Nurses and Physician Assistants to perform surgical abortions and aspiration abortions not requiring general anesthesia.
Provide that no person can be found civilly liable for the wrongful death of a fetus caused by an abortion, except for when a fetus is live-born but subsequently dies.
Mandate that public colleges and universities, including community colleges, must make emergency contraception accessible for purchase in at least one vending machine on each campus.
Allow birth centers, which have been places where mothers can give birth, to also provide abortions.
Require abortifacients to be covered at no-cost under insurance plans not otherwise exempt from state insurance law mandates.
Ensure there is no cause of action against a licensed health care professional for the wrongful death of a person caused by an abortion where abortion is permitted by law and consent was given.
Protect information about abortion from subpoenas and orders for testimony issued in other states.
Though tragic in scope, in a state that has already stripped away even parental notification, these new provisions should come as no surprise.
But in the wake of the landmark Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson, this dramatic escalation should signal to anyone seeking a new way forward on abortion post-Roe that we desperately need to take steps along that new path.
In a state with supermajority Democratic Party control, and in an environment where Democrats are increasingly hostile even to moderation on the issue of abortion, Democrats, Republicans and independents should seriously reconsider the efficacy of old approaches to abortion policy.
No legislative path to curtailing abortion on the supply side has any hope of getting through the state legislature anytime soon. If anyone were under any illusion about that, the lame duck session should quickly disabuse them of that notion.
Short of wholesale changes in the makeup of the electorate, the state will remain in the hands of a Democratic Party that will not accept anything short of abortion on-demand up to the point of birth.
I would suggest three necessary conditions for change in Illinois, and indeed in any blue state:
Democrats who identify as pro-life should accept that their party has left them behind. Progressives have an immediate option: leave the Democratic Party and join the only economically left-of-center pro-life party in America, the Solidarity Party. Until and unless pro-life Democrats show the party they are willing not to vote for Democrats, they will never overcome the money heaped on the party by the abortion industrial complex.
Republicans who identify as pro-life should accept that their party has no shot of winning statewide anytime soon. Conservatives have an immediate option: ditch GOP orthodoxy in favor of a communitarian, common good conservatism that will drive down abortion demand. Support a robust child tax credit. Support free-at-the-point-of-access health care. Support a basic income guarantee. Support worker-owned cooperatives. Support fairness for women in the workplace.
If point two sounds suspiciously like abandoning the GOP entirely, I accept the inference. In Illinois and around the country, today’s Republican Party, with few exceptions, does not appear inclined to support common good conservatism. By pairing strategically with Pro-life Democrats and abandoning the Republican Party for the Solidarity Party – a party where the largest plurality are former Republicans – common good conservatives would prove to be a formidable force. Given that the Republican Party’s disgraced but still powerful standard bearer, Donald Trump, has already taken the occasion of the midterm red ripple to throw the pro-life movement under the bus, I would suggest the time is right for the pro-life movement to abandon a party that in many places around the country ran away from the movement in 2022.
Next week, I’ll join tens of thousands of Americans in Washington, D.C. for the March for Life. We’ll mark a half century since Roe, and the first March for Life since Dobbs.
I’ll join my friends in the Solidarity Party, Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, Rehumanize International, Feminists for Life, young progressives in the Democrats for Life of America, Secular Pro-Life, leaders in the And Campaign, and others who don’t fit the mold of the stereotypical, tribally Republican pro-life advocate. While I’m there, I’ll call on those who do fit that mold to break the mold and to embrace a consistent life ethic.
Be sure to follow my social media platforms on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram for a special announcement about my own immediate future, and the steps I plan to take this year and next to chart a course toward a pro-life future for America.
I hope many of you, regardless of your party affiliation, will seek creative ways to move forward post-Dobbs to ensure that in every state in the union, abortion isn’t a choice any woman feels she needs to make.
Let’s mark the first full year after the fall of Roe by ditching the political path that turned abortion policy into a bitter, partisan fight for the last 50 years. Instead, let’s work together, even with people with whom we disagree on the issue of abortion, to create the conditions for life, and life more abundantly.
Do you have ideas for future Civic Update stories or want to contribute a story yourself? Email our editor by clicking the button below!
Just shared this CCU on the American Solidarity Party of California FB page!