Rahm Jumps Into Rough Mayoral Race

Rahm Emanuel officially announced his run for mayor of Chicago yesterday with this YouTube video, staring into the camera and promising to make a “Tell It Like It Is” tour around the city’s neighborhoods. “I want to hear from you in blunt terms,” Emanuel said. And so far his political opponents, at least, have obliged, the Washington Post reports. Before he could even arrive back in Chicago, other would-be mayors were calling him a carpetbagger, a bully, and an enemy to progressive causes.

“We’re not going to let people from outside our city explain how our township should be run,” says Sheriff Tom Dart. Liberals, he adds, blame Emanuel for the Obama administration’s failure to create a public health care option or pass immigration reform or gay rights legislation. Dart is one of dozens of would-be mayors who have come out of the woodwork since Richard Daley’s retirement. “I’m running,” says Alderman Robert Fioretti, who depicts the other candidates as “autocrats” and calls Emanuel a creature of the Clinton White House. “He was out of touch then, and he is out of touch now.” (More Rahm Emanuel stories.)