Another obscene giveaway
If Chicago had a civic motto, it might as well be: Hands up — don’t sue.
Once again, the Chicago City Council is preparing to write a fat check to people who helped turn the city upside down, this time in the form of a proposed $875,000 settlement to protesters from the 2020 George Floyd riots. Yes, riots. Not candlelight vigils. Not orderly marches. Riots — complete with arson, looting, vandalism, smashed police cars, and whole neighborhoods terrorized while City Hall wrung its hands and the police were told, in effect, to stand down.
And now — five years later — the city wants to reward the very people who helped inflict that chaos.
This is not compassion. It is cowardice.
It is not justice. It is extortion by lawsuit.
And it is part of a long, disgraceful pattern that has helped push Chicago to the edge of fiscal collapse.
A city that can't say 'no'
Chicago has become an easy mark. Everyone knows it. Trial lawyers know it. Activist groups know it. Professional agitators know it. If you can frame yourself as a “victim,” preferably of the police, the city will eventually fold, no matter the facts, no matter the cost, no matter the broader damage to public order.
The latest proposed settlement arises from lawsuits filed by George Floyd protesters who claim Chicago police used “brutal” and “unconstitutional” tactics during the unrest of 2020. According to the complaints, officers allegedly used pepper spray, physical force, and crowd-control measures that injured demonstrators.
Let’s pause here for a reality check.
Those “demonstrators” were part of an uprising that paralyzed the city. Chicago police cars were torched in the streets. Businesses — many of them minority-owned — were looted and destroyed. Downtown corridors were turned into war zones. And all of this happened while then-Mayor Lori Lightfoot — whom I’ve long referred to as "Lori Lighthead" — vacillated, moralized, and ultimately failed to lead.
Police officers were ordered to tolerate behavior that would not have been tolerated in any functioning city. They were told to retreat, to absorb abuse, to let criminals run wild — all in the name of optics.
And now the city wants to say those same officers went too far.
You can’t make this up.
Paying for lawlessness — again and again
This settlement does not exist in a vacuum. It is merely the latest chapter in Chicago’s long history of rewarding bad behavior.
For decades, Chicago taxpayers have been on the hook for millions of dollars in police-related settlements and judgments — often paid not because the city lost in court, but because City Hall decided it was easier to pay than to fight.
We’ve seen this movie before:
- Massive payouts related to police actions during previous protests and crowd-control incidents.
- Enormous wrongful-conviction settlements, many tied to systemic failures the city refused to fix until it was forced to.
- Endless “nuisance settlements” where the city cuts a check simply to avoid discovery, depositions, and political embarrassment.
The Chicago Transit Authority has long been another favorite target. The CTA has been notorious for settling dubious injury claims — slip-and-falls, phantom injuries, and lawsuits so flimsy they would have collapsed under serious scrutiny. But the CTA paid anyway. Why? It was done on the theory it was cheaper in the short term.
Short-term thinking is Chicago’s superpower.
From Lightfoot to Mayor 6.6
The George Floyd unrest happened under Lori Lightfoot, but the mindset that produced it is alive and well today — perhaps even worse.
Lightfoot, who now fancies herself a crusader against federal immigration enforcement, is reportedly helping compile databases of alleged ICE misconduct. In other words, she’s aiding efforts to obstruct federal law enforcement — something she seemed perfectly comfortable doing to her own police department back when Chicago Police were trying to keep the city from burning.
Fast-forward to today, and we have Mayor Brandon Johnson — Mayor 6.6, a man who treats law enforcement as if it were a communicable disease. This is a mayor who has openly echoed rhetoric suggesting policing itself is the problem. A mayor whose ideological allies chant “ACAB” — All Cops Are Bastards — while violent criminals cycle in and out of custody.
The result?
Chicago is down roughly 2,200 police officers, morale is shattered, and proactive policing has been replaced by bureaucratic paralysis.
And now City Hall wants to tell officers: By the way, if you do try to control a riot, we might throw you under the bus five years later.
The death spiral
This is how cities die — not with a bang, but with a settlement agreement.
Every time Chicago pays out one of these lawsuits, it sends a message:
- Law enforcement will not be defended.
- Disorder will be excused.
- Litigation will be rewarded.
The fiscal consequences are obvious. Chicago is teetering on the edge of bankruptcy, in a state that is itself drowning in debt. Pension obligations are crushing. Credit ratings are fragile. Taxes are already obscene.
But the second-order effects are even worse.
When law-abiding citizens see criminals rewarded and police restrained, they leave. They take their income taxes, property taxes, and sales taxes with them. Businesses follow. The tax base shrinks. Crime rises. And City Hall responds by raising taxes on the people who haven’t fled — yet.
That is a classic urban death spiral.
There is no excuse
There is no excuse whatsoever for paying these protesters a dime.
None.
If City Hall had any backbone, it would fight these cases all the way up the judicial ladder. It would defend its officers. It would make clear that riots, vandalism, and mass lawlessness are not protected activities.
Instead, the city is signaling that if you riot hard enough and sue long enough, you’ll eventually get paid.
That is not governance. That is surrender.
Radical change — or else
Chicago does not need more commissions, more consent decrees, or more performative apologies. It needs leaders with the courage to say no.
No to shakedown lawsuits.
No to criminal romanticism.
No to the idea that law enforcement is the enemy and chaos is a form of speech.
The Democratic Party machine that controls this city, this county, and this state has lost the plot. It’s like watching the Three Stooges attempt fiscal management — except the consequences are real, and the joke is on us.
Until Chicago elects leaders with actual common sense — leaders willing to defend public order and stop rewarding lawlessness — this insanity will continue.
Another settlement.
Another check.
Another reason to leave.
And one day, when the money finally runs out, City Hall will act shocked.
But the rest of us saw it coming.
