Former congressman and White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel won the most votes in Tuesday’s Chicago mayoral election, but he failed to receive the degree of support needed from voters to avoid a runoff election in April.
In his quest for a second term as Chicago mayor, Emanuel won 46 percent of the vote. Election law states that should the winning candidate in a municipal race fail to win more than 50 percent of the overall vote, he or she must face off with the second-place challenger in a separate runoff election.
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However, Garcia and his fellow challengers had some success painting Emanuel as out of touch with Chicago’s neighborhoods and obsessed instead with the city’s central business district and tourism reputation. Garcia was particularly critical of Emanuel for not hiring 1,000 new city police officers, as he had said he would do during his 2011 campaign. Garcia has insisted he would make good on that promise but has offered few details on how the cash-strapped city would finance it.
While voter registration was up in Chicago leading up to the election, compared to 2011 numbers, voter turnout on Tuesday was expected to be on par with the 33 percent record low turnout set in 2007, RedEye reported.
